OldN 
 

 O 
 
BALLADS 
 OF OLD NEW YORK 
 
 V 
 
BOOKS BY 
 ARTHUR GUITERMANN 
 
 BALLADS OF OLD NEW YORK 
 THE LAUGHING MUSE 
 THE MIRTHFUL LYRE 
 
 HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK 
 [ESTABLISHED 1817] 
 
Ballad^ of 
 OldNewYork 
 
 Ar&xxar 
 
 .Author of 
 
 "TheMiriMul I^yr . Etc 
 
 Illustrated Toy OT. ScotfWiUiams 
 
The author acknowledges with thanks the 
 courtesy of the editors of Life, Everybody s 
 Magazine, Harper s Magazine, the New York 
 Times, the Youth s Companion, Woman s Home 
 Companion, House and Garden, the New York 
 World, McClure s Magazine and the New York 
 Tribune in granting permission to reprint many 
 of the ballads and lyrics in this collection. 
 
 BALLADS OF OLD NEW YORK 
 
 Copyright, 1920, by Harper & Brothers 
 
 Printed in the United States of America 
 
 Published February, 1920 
 
 B-U 
 
DEDICATION 
 
 LOOKING westward from my window I catch a 
 glimpse of the old mansion in which Washington 
 Irving once lived and wrote; a few blocks to the 
 southward is the tomb where Peter Stuyvesant lies 
 buried; and but a little farther to the north and 
 west stands the house in which Theodore Roosevelt 
 was born. Below, among the green trees of 
 Stuyvesant Park, shoals of children are playing, 
 children of many races, types of those with whom, 
 in a large measure, lies the future of this city that 
 I love. Here on the borders of the great East 
 Side, where Past and Future meet, is the proper 
 place to be martialing the varied traditions of 
 New York and its neighborhood, piecing together 
 colorful stories of the Past for those who are to 
 inherit the Future. Yet these are but a few of a 
 host of such legends. For, as under the tons of 
 steel and stone with which we have seen fit to 
 burden our lovely Island of Manhattan, silently 
 flow hidden streams such as the Old Wreck Brook 
 and Minetta Water streams once sparkling in the 
 sunlight and alive with bright-sided trout, though 
 now dark and forgotten likewise beneath the 
 stern and heavy masonry of Modernity ripple many 
 silver rivulets of Old Romance. 
 
 And so these rambling tales of the hardy founders 
 of a great commonwealth are dedicated to all who, 
 like those true men of earlier days, shall believe in 
 clean living, hard working, and good fighting; yet 
 more especially are they dedicated to the valiant 
 and happy memory of those three good New- 
 Yorkers Peter Stuyvesant, Washington Irving, 
 and Theodore Roosevelt. 
 
 THE STUYVESANT BOUWERIE 
 June, Jpip 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 DEDICATION v 
 
 VOORREDE (PROLOGUE) i 
 
 DUTCH PERIOD 
 
 HUDSON S VOYAGE 5 
 
 INTERLUDE HUDSON n 
 
 DUTCHMAN S BREECHES 13 
 
 INTERLUDE AN APRIL ROMANCE .... 19 
 
 THE LEGEND OF THE BRONX 20 
 
 INTERLUDE THE CRITICS 24 
 
 RAMBOUT VAN DAM 25 
 
 INTERLUDE EIGHT OARS AND A COXSWAIN 30 
 
 How PEARL STREET WAS PAVED 32 
 
 INTERLUDE AN OLD ROAD 38 
 
 THE LORD OF THE DUNDERBERG 40 
 
 INTERLUDE THUNDER-STORM 49 
 
 A LEGEND OF MAIDEN LANE 50 
 
 INTERLUDE A SONG IN JUNE 57 
 
 THE RATTLE-WATCH OF NEW AMSTERDAM ... 59 
 
 INTERLUDE MINETTA WATER 66 
 
 SLEEPY HOLLOW 68 
 
 INTERLUDE A SPRINGTIME PILGRIMAGE . . 75 
 
 A SCANDAL IN NEW AMSTERDAM 77 
 
 INTERLUDE KISSING BRIDGE 85 
 
PAGE 
 
 A TRIAL IN NEW AMSTERDAM 89 
 
 INTERLUDE ON THE HARLEM 94 
 
 WILLIAM THE TESTY 96 
 
 INTERLUDE THE ROAD 101 
 
 THE PIRATE S SPUKE 103 
 
 INTERLUDE STORM SIGNALS m 
 
 A DEAL IN REAL ESTATE 112 
 
 INTERLUDE POSSESSION . 117 
 
 WIZARD S WELL n8 
 
 INTERLUDE HALLOWE EN CHARM .... 125 
 
 BORGER JORIS S HAMMER I 2 6 
 
 INTERLUDE A LILT IN FALL 133 
 
 THE CHANGE OF FLAGS 134 
 
 ENGLISH COLONIAL PERIOD 
 
 POLLY CORTELYOU 143 
 
 INTERLUDE CITY HALL PARK 149 
 
 THE STORM SHIP 15! 
 
 INTERLUDE OFF FIRE ISLAND 159 
 
 THE THANK-OFFERING 160 
 
 INTERLUDE SAXON HARVEST HEALTH . . 164 
 
 TUBBY HOOK 165 
 
 INTERLUDE THE HOUSE OF BLAZES . . . 170 
 
 ZENGER THE PRINTER 172 
 
 INTERLUDE THE RIVER 176 
 
 BUTTERMILK CHANNEL 178 
 
 INTERLUDE A CITY GARDEN 183 
 
 BOWLING GREEN 185 
 
 REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 
 
 MARY MURRAY OF MURRAY HILL 193 
 
 INTERLUDE UNCLE SAM TO JOHN BULL . . 199 
 
PAGE 
 
 HAARLEM HEIGHTS 201 
 
 INTERLUDE THE BLOCKHOUSE IN THE PARK 208 
 
 THE STORMING OF STONY POINT 210 
 
 INTERLUDE OLD TRINITY 215 
 
 THE FATE OF THE HESSIAN 217 
 
 INTERLUDE THE INN: AN OLD EPITAPH . 222 
 
 THE DYCKMAN HOUSE 223 
 
 INTERLUDE OUR COLONEL 228 
 
 A RAID OF THE NEUTRAL GROUND 230 
 
 INTERLUDE WASHINGTON IN WALL STREET . 237 
 
 FORT TYRON 240 
 
 INTERLUDE DECATUR S TOAST 243 
 
 THE BALLAD OF JOHN PAUL JONES 245 
 
 INTERLUDE THE OLD CONSTITUTION . . . 252 
 
 FRAUNCES* TAVERN 257 
 
 MISCELLANEOUS 
 
 THE PALISADES 261 
 
 INTERLUDE UNDER THE PALISADES . . . 265 
 
 THE DEVIL S STEPPING-STONES 267 
 
 INTERLUDE A SEA CHARM 272 
 
 MONTGOMERY S RETURN 274 
 
 INTERLUDE A DREAMER 278 
 
 DUTCHMAN S QUIRK 279 
 
 INTERLUDE NEW YORK 287 
 
 THE "CLERMONT" 288 
 
 INTERLUDE GREAT Is DIANA OF THE MAN- 
 
 NAHATTOES! 2Q2 
 
 THE HALL OF FAME 294 
 
 EPILOGUE THE BOOK LINE 299 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 PAGE 
 AND EVER THEY PUFFED AS THEY PONDERED, AND 
 
 QUAFFED, 
 TO CLEAR THEIR PERCEPTIONS, FULL MANY A 
 
 DRAUGHT, 
 
 AND DINED ON THE OYSTERS 35 
 
 WlLD WAS THE LAUGHTER THAT QUAKING MEN 
 HEARD THROUGH THE NIGHT FROM THE GOBLIN 
 
 GLEN 45 
 
 THE RATTLE-WATCH OF NEW AMSTERDAM . . 61 
 "THEN SUCH A COMMOTION YOU NEVER SAW! 
 VROUW ANNEKE VOWED SHE WOULD HAVE THE 
 
 LAW." 81 
 
 KISSING BRIDGE 87 
 
 LIGHT AS WIND-BLOWN THISTLE-DOWN 
 
 UP THE WOODLAND PATH SHE SPED 121 
 
 MARY MURRAY OF MURRAY HILL 195 
 
 LAUGHING, THEY SWARMED TO THE CRESTED HEIGHT, 
 
 STEEL TO THE STEEL OF THE GRENADIERS! . 213 
 "Up! BULLY BOYS OF THE NEPPERHAN? 
 
 GATHER! YE TROOPERS, GRIM AND ROUGH." . 233 
 
VOORREDE 
 
 (Prologue) 
 
 STEENDAM the Poet (whom all men know) 
 Cuddled his fiddle and poised the bow; 
 Quoth a, "True lovers of tales of sprites, 
 Goblins and phantoms that walk o nights, 
 Battles and pirates and pleasant nooks, 
 Quaint, homely legends from musty books, 
 Hear! for I carol in lilting rhymes 
 Rollicking lays of the Good Old Times!" 
 
Duicli 
 Period 
 
HUDSON S VOYAGE 
 
 "A VERY good land to fall with and a pleasant 
 *^ land to see." Thus wrote Mate Robert Juet 
 in description of the region of broken islands and 
 rocky hills bordering the deep harbor into which 
 the Half Moon plowed her way on the 3d of 
 September, 1609. Five months earlier the Hal] 
 Moon had sailed from Amsterdam to search for a 
 passage to India by the northeast; but, baffled by 
 headwinds and the ice and cold of Nova Zembla 
 and the consequent dissensions among his crew, 
 her experienced navigator, Master Henry Hudson, 
 had changed her course about, steering westward 
 for the shores of the New World. 
 
 After a long coasting trip, south and north 
 again, Hudson entered New York Bay. Hoping 
 that the broad channel of the river that now bears 
 
 Esl 
 
his riarite mfeht prove to be the long-sought pas 
 sage to the Orient, he followed the stream beyond 
 the present site of Albany; then, seeing that the 
 search was fruitless, he returned to report his 
 momentous discoveries. 
 
HUDSON S VOYAGE 
 
 "THROUGH the ice of Nova Zembla, through the 
 fogs that held us long, 
 
 We had sought the Northeast fairway till a head 
 wind blowing strong 
 
 Bade us swing the kicking rudder; and we filled 
 and bore away 
 
 Ever Westward for a passage to the portals of 
 Cathay. 
 
 "And we sailed o er seas uncharted, rolling black 
 
 and green and blue, 
 
 Till we hailed the coastal ranges of the world 
 they call the New! 
 
 [7) 
 
And we saw a wooded headland rising boldly on 
 our lee 
 
 Twas a goodly land to fall with and a pleasant 
 land to see 
 
 Where an ocean channel broadened to a hill- 
 encompassed bay, 
 
 And I deemed it was the highroad to the treas 
 ures of Cathay. 
 
 s There we moored our vessel safely from the 
 
 swirling autumn tides, 
 And the Red Men in their shallops came and 
 
 stroked her salty sides; 
 
 As they marveled at her hugeness of our friend 
 ship they were fain, 
 And they brought us pipes of copper, mellow 
 
 grapes, and yellow grain. 
 When I questioned them for tidings of our 
 
 much-desired goal, 
 Though their savage tongue I knew not, yet they 
 
 beckoned toward the Pole. 
 So we heaved the Half Moons anchor and we 
 
 got her under way, 
 And we shaped our voyage Northward for the 
 
 harbors of Cathay. 
 [8] 
 
" Fifty leagues we drew a furrow on that water 
 way unknown, 
 Past the bowered outer islands, under cliffs of 
 
 living stone, 
 Skirting sunlit fields that billowed to the shores 
 
 of inland seas, 
 Under shadowed rocky ranges with their crests of 
 
 noble trees, 
 Till the channel shoaled and narrowed in a 
 
 reach of highland plain, 
 And the brackish water sweetened and we knew 
 
 our quest was vain. 
 Twas the River of the Mountains, where the 
 
 silver salmon play; 
 And o er yet untraversed waters lies the passage 
 
 to Cathay. 
 
 "So, aboard again, my trusties! for the spirit will 
 
 not rest; 
 We must find the golden passage, be it East or 
 
 be it West. 
 With a seaman s craft and courage, with a 
 
 single heart and soul, 
 We shall search that ocean fairway from the 
 
 Tropics to the Pole. 
 
 [93 
 
Yet, when softly lap the surges, in my cabin I 
 may dream 
 
 Of the mighty mountain river, of that broadly 
 rolling stream, 
 
 Where I heard the hum of nations in the whis 
 per of the shrouds, 
 
 While, as breath of future cities, rose the white 
 September clouds. 
 
 What is all the dazzling treasure that the jew 
 eled East may give 
 
 To our new-discovered countries where the sons 
 of men shall live! 
 
 But the offshore breezes freshen and the tide- 
 rush will not stay; 
 
 So unmoor, and set the tiller for the sea-road 
 to Cathay!" 
 
HUDSON 
 
 Ma-hican-ittuck! 
 
 River of the Mountains, 
 Poured to the sea 
 
 From Adirondack crags, 
 Buoying the leafy 
 
 Tribute of your fountains. 
 Rocking the navies 
 
 Of a hundred flags! 
 
 Forests are yours. 
 
 And fair embowered islands; 
 
 hi] 
 
Cities are yours 
 
 Whose towers touch the skies. 
 Curve grandly down 
 
 Your goblin-haunted Highlands; 
 Lave, golden-waved, 
 
 The vale where Irving lies. 
 
 Deep-breasted stream, 
 
 What tales your hills have told me! 
 Playmate and friend 
 
 In days of youthful glow, 
 Now, as of old, 
 
 In crystal arms enfold me; 
 Take me again 
 
 Within your cooling flow! 
 
 Plunging, I watch 
 
 Your deeper waters changing 
 Gold-lighted green 
 
 To amethystine shade; 
 Strong-armed and free, 
 
 Your boundless bosom ranging, 
 My heart in yours 
 
 Beats warm and unafraid. 
 
 [12] 
 
DUTCHMAN S BREECHES 
 
 JUST after the starry flowers of the hepatica 
 have appeared among the dead leaves, yet be 
 fore the violets have come, the wooded spaces on 
 and near the Island of Manhattan are beautified 
 with innumerable clusters of quaint little white- 
 and-yellow blossoms known to the schoolmen as 
 Dicentra cucullaria; but the children, ever quick 
 to recognize true resemblances, call them "Dutch- 
 
 [13] 
 
man s breeches." That this name is not due to a 
 mere chance resemblance is shown by this tale of 
 the founding of a great city which will be found, 
 in part, confirmed in the chronicles of the immortal 
 Diedrich Knickerbocker. 
 
 Bowling Green is believed to have been the scene 
 of that first great land purchase with which the 
 true history of New York properly begins. 
 
DUTCHMAN S BREECHES 
 
 A May-Day Legend of Mannahatta 
 
 TWAS in the month when lilacs bloom, 
 When apple-blossoms breathe perfume 
 To call the bees; when bluebirds throng, 
 When bobolink regains his song; 
 When, clear and cloudless, archly smile 
 The dear blue skies that love our isle. 
 
 Across a dimpling, dancing bay 
 That laved its bows with golden spray, 
 Full-sailed, a little squadron bore 
 To Mannahatta s virgin shore 
 
A city s founders Kips, Van Dorns, 
 
 Van Tienhovens, Schermerhorns, 
 
 Van Dams, Van Wycks, Van Dycks, Van Pelts, 
 
 And Onderdoncks and Roosevelts. 
 
 Right glad they leaped ashore when lo! 
 
 With threatening spear, and supple bow 
 
 In menace bent, a stately band 
 
 Of woodland chieftains barred the strand. 
 
 "In peace return!" a sachem old 
 
 Began; "This bowered isle we hold 
 
 As sacred ever blessed anew 
 
 By footprints of the Manitou; 
 
 Nor may we yield, for blood or spoil, 
 
 Our birthright in its hallowed soil." 
 
 Rejoined that man of subtle wit 
 The wily Peter Minuit, 
 "Hail, noble chiefs! Your island s fame 
 Hath reached the land from whence we came, 
 Wide leagues away. But little space 
 We crave a meager resting-place. 
 Behold these keen-edged knives; this store 
 Of well-barbed hooks and beads galore; 
 fi61 
 
These blankets and this fragrant cask! 
 For all, a poor exchange we ask: 
 The scanty plot of countryside 
 A Dutchman s breeches serve to hide!" 
 
 The chief assented with a smile 
 (Alas! unskilled in Paleface guile!) 
 Then, loyal to his leader s look, 
 Advanced the sturdy Gert Ten Broeck 
 Through Holland noted far and near 
 For amplitude of nether gear 
 And spread, amid a hush profound, 
 His mighty garment on the ground! 
 
 Perhaps the wonder came to pass 
 By grace of good Saint Nicholas; 
 Perhaps a marvelous array 
 The Dutchman wore I cannot say; 
 But, while the Red Men stared, dismayed, 
 Ten Broeck, in silence, stripped and laid 
 His mystic garments, row on row, 
 Until to Spuyten Duyvil s flow 
 A cloud of knickerbockers quite 
 Obscured the soil from mortal sight! 
 
 [17] 
 
And thus our cherished dwelling-place 
 Was ransomed from the savage race. 
 
 For proof you ask? Ah, skeptic few! 
 
 Will Nature s word suffice for you? 
 
 Attend! When flower-laden May 
 
 Is ushered in by Moving Day, 
 
 And all our folk, with van and stage, 
 
 Renew the ancient pilgrimage 
 
 Where still, unchained by steel and stone, 
 
 The Gentle Goddess holds her own, 
 
 Appear on clustered stems a clan 
 
 Of dancing blossoms, known to man 
 
 As "Dutchman s Breeches" in the style 
 
 Of Sixteen-Twenty. Thus our isle 
 
 Again displays in every nook 
 
 The garments of the great Ten Broeck. 
 
 18 
 
AN APRIL ROMANCE 
 
 The crystal spears of slantwise-driven Rain 
 Right gallantly assail the churlish Mold 
 
 That in his frozen fastness doth enchain 
 
 The Princess Daffodil, of trembling gold. 
 3 
 
THE LEGEND OF THE BRONX 
 
 A MONG the earliest settlers north of the Haar- 
 "^^ lem was Jonas Bronck, a well-to-do Danish 
 Lutheran who arrived about 1640. He chose for 
 his plantation a goodly tract bordering the quiet 
 stream then and thereafter known as "Brorick s 
 Kill," but by the Indians called "Ah-qua-hung," 
 which some interpret "Place of peace" a name 
 that seems to have been echoed in the early title 
 of Westchester village, "Vredeland," or "Land of 
 Peace." The old native name acquired a new 
 significance in 1642 when the disastrous war with 
 the Wecquaesgeek Indians was ended by the sign 
 ing of a treaty of peace in the house that Jonas 
 Bronck had built. 
 
 [20] 
 
The learned Steendam has preserved a legend 
 of the miraculous way in which the father of the 
 new settlement was drawn to the site of his future 
 home, a legend no less authentic than the cher 
 ished tales of the founding of Thebes, Carthage, 
 and Rome. 
 
 [21] 
 
THE LEGEND OF THE BRONX 
 
 WITH sword and Bible, brood and dame, 
 Across the seas from Denmark came 
 Stout Jonas Bronck. He roved among 
 The wooded vales of Ah-qua-hung. 
 "Good sooth! on every hand," quoth he, 
 "Are pleasant lands and fair to see; 
 But which were best to plow and till 
 And meetest both for manse and mill?" 
 
 "Bronck! Bronck! Bronck!" 
 
 Called the frogs from the reeds of the river; 
 "Bronck! Bronck! Bronck!" 
 
 From the marshes and pools of the stream. 
 "Here let your journeyings cease; 
 
 Blest of the Bounteous Giver, 
 Yours is the Valley of Peace, 
 
 Here is the home of your dream." 
 
 "Oho!" laughed Jonas Bronck; "I ween 
 These pop-eyed elves in bottle-green 
 
 [22] 
 
Do call my name to show the spot 
 Predestined! Here I cast my lot!" 
 So there he reared his dwelling-place 
 And built a mill, with wheel and race. 
 And even now, beneath the hill 
 When summer nights are fair and still: 
 
 "Bronck! Bronck! Bronck!" 
 
 Rise the cadenced batrachian numbers; 
 "Bronck! Bronck! Bronck!" 
 
 Chant a myriad chorister gnomes; 
 "High on the shadowy crest 
 
 Under the hemlock he slumbers. 
 Here is the region of rest; 
 
 Come to our Valley of Homes!" 
 
 [23] 
 
THE CRITICS 
 
 The moon was up and I was young: 
 No matter what I dared to write, 
 
 But how it woke each sportive tongue 
 Of little elves that haunt the night! 
 
 Though Crickets chanted, "True, true, true!" 
 The Tree Toads piped, " Tis not! Tis not!" 
 
 The Hermit H owlet jeered, "Hoof hoo!" 
 And Gaffer Bullfrog blurted, "Rot!" 
 
 So, red with wrath, I flung the scrawl 
 Across the walk and lo! by day. 
 
 The Dew, the truest friend of all, 
 Had washed those erring lines away. 
 
 24] 
 
RAMBOUT VAN DAM 
 
 TVTOW this, the legend of the Flying Dutchman 
 * ^ of the Tappan Zee the broad reach of the 
 Hudson at Tarrytown is entitled to particular 
 respect as a double-barreled tract against pro 
 fanity and Sabbath-breaking. Any one who chooses 
 to follow by rowboat Rambout s course from the 
 mouth of the Spuyten Duyvil up the river about 
 as far as Nyack will have (in addition to blistered 
 hands) a great respect for the hero s prowess as 
 an oarsman. 
 
 "Zee" should really be pronounced as if spelled 
 "Zay"; but the popular pronunciation, which is 
 in accordance with the actual spelling, has been 
 adopted in this and subsequent ballads as being 
 that which is likely to prevail. 
 
 [25] 
 
RAMBOUT VAN DAM 
 THE FLYING DUTCHMAN OF THE TAPPAN ZEE 
 
 ON Tappan Zee a shroud of gray 
 
 Is heavy, dank, and low; 
 All dimly gleams the beacon-ray 
 
 Of White Pocantico. 
 
 No skipper braves old Hudson now 
 Where Nyack s headlands frown, 
 
 And safely moored is every prow 
 Of drowsy Tarrytown; 
 
 Yet, clear as word of human lip, 
 
 The river sends its shores 
 The rhythmic rullock-clank and drip 
 
 Of even-rolling oars. 
 [26! 
 
What rower plies a reckless oar 
 With mist on flood and strand? 
 
 That oarsman toils for evermore, 
 And ne er shall reach the land! 
 
 Roistering, rollicking Ram van Darn, 
 Fond of a frolic and fond of a dram, 
 Fonder yea, fonder, proclaims Renown, 
 Of Tryntje Bogardus of Tarrytown, 
 Leave Spuyten Duyvil to roar his song! 
 Pull! for the current is sly and strong; 
 Nestles the robin and flies the bat. 
 Ho! for the frolic at Kakiat! 
 Merry the sport at the quilting-bee 
 Held at the farm by the Tappan Zee! 
 Jovial labor with quips and flings 
 Dances with wonderful pigeonwings, 
 Twitter of maidens and clack of dames, 
 Honest flirtations and rousing games; 
 Platters of savory beef and brawn, 
 Buckets of treacle and good suppawn, 
 Oceans of cider and beer in lakes, 
 Mountains of crullers and honey-cakes 
 
 [271 
 
Such entertainment should never pall! 
 Rambout van Dam took his fill of all; 
 Laughed with the wittiest, worked with a zest, 
 Danced with the prettiest, drank with the best. 
 
 Oh, that enjoyment should breed annoy! 
 Tryntje grew fickle, or cold or coy; 
 Rambout, possessed of a jealous sprite, 
 Scowled like the sky on a stormy night, 
 Snarled a "good-by" from his sullen throat, 
 Blustered away to his tugging boat. 
 After him hastened Jacobus Horn: 
 "Stay with us, Rambout, till Monday morn. 
 Soon in the east will the dawn be gray; 
 Rest from thy oars on the Sabbath Day." 
 Angrily, Rambout van Dam ripped back: 
 "Dunder en blixem! du Schobbejak! 
 Preach to thy children! and let them know 
 Spite of the Duyvil and thee, I ll row 
 Thousands of Sundays, if need there be, 
 Home o er this ewig-vervlekte zee!" 
 Muttering curses, he headed south. 
 Jacob, astounded, with open mouth 
 Watched him receding, when crash on crash 
 Volleyed the thunder! A hissing flash 
 [28! 
 
Smote on the river! He looked again: 
 Rambout was gone from the sight of men! 
 
 Old Dunderberg with grumbling roar 
 Hath warned the fog to flee, 
 
 But still that never-wearied oar 
 Is heard on Tappan Zee. 
 
 A moon is closed in Hudson s breast 
 And lanterns gem the town; 
 
 The phantom craft that may not rest 
 Plies ever, up and down, 
 
 Neath skies of blue and skies of gray, 
 
 In spite of wind or tide, 
 Until the trump of Judgment Day; 
 
 A sound and naught beside. 
 
 29 
 
EIGHT OARS AND A COXSWAIN 
 
 Eight oars compel 
 
 Our darting shelly 
 Eight oar-blades flash the sun; 
 
 The hard arms thrill, 
 
 The deep lungs fill, 
 Eight backs are bent as one. 
 
 All silver lined 
 
 We leave behind 
 Each wave of somber hue. 
 
 "Stroke! Stroke! 
 
 Stroke! Stroke! 
 Steady, Number Two!" 
 [30] 
 
The sea-gulls go, 
 
 A drift of snow, 
 On Hudson s lights and shades; 
 
 The eagle swings 
 
 On splendid wings 
 Above the Palisades. 
 
 Let Caution steer 
 
 The shore anear, 
 But Valor takes the tide. 
 
 "Stroke! Stroke! 
 
 Stroke! Stroke! 
 Ease your forward slide? 
 
 A fair league still 
 
 To old Cock Hill, 
 Where Spuyten Duyvil roars. 
 
 No time for play; 
 
 Give way; give way! 
 And bend the driven oars! 
 
 When breezes blow 
 
 Then feather low 
 With level blades and true. 
 
 "Stroke! Stroke! 
 
 Stroke! Stroke! 
 Steady! Pull it thr-o-o-ough!" 
 
HOW PEARL STREET WAS PAVED 
 
 A LTHOUGH the statement has been made as 
 ** a jest and is generally regarded as such, it is 
 nevertheless literally true that several of the old 
 streets of New York were originally laid out by 
 the public-spirited cows of the settlers. An in 
 stance of this primitive method of road-engineering 
 exists in crooked old Pearl Street, the lower part 
 of which formed the original water-front of New 
 Amsterdam on the east. This street, thus almost 
 miraculously created, received its first pavement 
 in a manner likewise so happy (and economical) 
 as to justify both the burghers of old and their 
 modern successors in trusting to Providence for 
 the furtherance of public improvements. 
 
 [32] 
 
HOW PEARL STREET WAS PAVED 
 
 IN Wouter Van Twiller s manorial pale 
 There flourished a cow (and she flourished a tail) 
 Safe-housed, where the Battery guarded the shore 
 In kindly communion with many cows more. 
 Awaking from visions of clover, each morn 
 She drowsily lowed to the drover whose horn 
 Was blown at each byre; then, leading the line 
 Of sleepy New Amsterdam s somnolent kine, 
 She sauntered with Sukey and Brindle and all 
 Away to the Common beyond the Town Wall. 
 
 The route that she plodded by hillock and stream 
 Was crookedly quaint as a summer night s dream; 
 For, though at the start, like an orderly beast, 
 She skirted the river that flows on the east, 
 
 [33] 
 
Soon, tempted by boskage and cress of the best, 
 She rambled and browsed to the north or the west; 
 Till, trodden each morning and evening, there 
 
 showed 
 
 A devious pathway that wore to a road 
 Where brick-fronted houses began to appear 
 To crown the caprice of that "Boss * engineer. 
 (And this is the cause of the intricate way 
 The streets of New Amsterdam wander to-day.) 
 
 Next, keen for progression, the burghers decreed 
 The street should be paved with the uttermost 
 
 speed, 
 
 And chose a committee of good men and true 
 To think out the problem and put the thing 
 
 through. 
 
 Van Bommel, Van Keuren, Hans Jacobson Kol, 
 Claes Tysen, Joost Smeeman, and Huybertsen Mol, 
 All stout at the trencher and wise in debate, 
 Held council portentous both early and late. 
 
 They grouped on the road at the first flush of dawn 
 With pipes of tobacco and bowls of suppawn 
 And dreamed of all pavings that ever were known 
 Block, corduroy, cement, gold, mortar, and stone. 
 
 [34] 
 
And ever they puffed as they pondered, and quaffed, 
 To clear their perceptions, full many a draught, 
 And dined on the oysters abounding of yore 
 In numberless shoals on our fortunate shore. 
 (The bivalves our fathers deemed worthy of praise 
 Were giants that mock these degenerate days; 
 For find me an oyster, in bay, creek, or foss 
 To-day, that will measure twelve inches across!) 
 
 A fortnight they tarried to feast and perpend, 
 Surveying the road from beginning to end; 
 When lo! what a mountain of labor was saved; 
 For, e en as they feasted, the road had been paved, 
 And paved for the tread of a prince or an earl 
 With oyster-shells, brilliant in mother-of-pearl! 
 So "Pearl" was the name, undeniably meet, 
 The burghers bestowed on that marvelous street. 
 
 Twas thus that our city s progenitors showed 
 The very best method of paving a road: 
 Appoint a committee to dally and doubt 
 And somehow the matter will work itself out. 
 So, taught by experience, that is the way 
 We manage the streets of the city to-day. 
 
 [37 
 
AN OLD ROAD 
 
 In days that were no matter when 
 Twas not a weed-grown palindrome, 
 
 At either end a dreamy glen, 
 
 But led, like other roads, to Rome. 
 
 Its dust was ridged by many wheels 
 
 That rolled to market, church, and fair; 
 
 But now a wave of grass conceals 
 The road that leads not anywhere. 
 
 The chipmunk haunts its tumbled walls 
 Where roses wait the wild-bee s kiss, 
 
 And honeysuckle droops and falls 
 Entwined with ropes of clematis. 
 
 And here the nesting meadow-lark 
 Hath built; and wisps of maidenhair 
 
 Cfer-veil the grooves that faintly mark 
 The road that leads not anywhere. 
 
 [38] 
 
Because it bore the grinding jar 
 Of sullen wheels from year to year, 
 
 Its twilight owns a softer star 
 A sweeter silence lingers here. 
 
 And we, outworn by toil and stress. 
 As truant urchins let us fare, 
 
 Like our dear pathway, purposeless 
 The road that leads not anywhere. 
 
 [39] 
 
THE LORD OF THE DUNDERBERG 
 
 AX 7 HEN the Goede Vrouw discharged upon our 
 ^ shores her load of hearty Dutch settlers, 
 she also let loose a horde of old-world sprites and 
 goblins, elvish stowaways, who, unknown to cap 
 tain or crew, had followed the fortunes of their 
 mortal fellow-countrymen to the New World. 
 These were no flimsy-winged sylphs and fairies, 
 idling away their time slumbering in roses or danc 
 ing on the green. Honest, homely Robin Good- 
 fellows were they all, delighting in useful labor and 
 rough sport; benevolent, yet prone to mischief; 
 friends to man, but jealously exacting from him 
 all traditional dues of tribute and honor. Well 
 fitted to cope with the ruggedness of an untamed 
 land, they spread rapidly through the valley of the 
 Hudson, peopling its glens with their hardy brood. 
 The chieftain of the most powerful of these 
 goblin clans was the Heer or Lord of the Dunder- 
 berg. His dominions extended through the High 
 lands of the Hudson from the Dunderberg or 
 Thunder Mountain, commanding the perilous 
 
 [40] 
 
strait of the Devil s Race, at the south, to Pollopel 
 (which means "Soupladle") Island that lies in the 
 Wind Gate, as the northern entrance to the en 
 chanted region is known. This potentate, while 
 by no means of a malignant disposition, was ex 
 ceedingly tenacious of his prerogatives; and woe 
 betide the skipper who neglected to pay homage 
 by lowering his flag on entering the domain of him 
 who had at his command all the gales and tempests 
 that lay snugly tucked away in the recesses of the 
 hills! 
 
 [41] 
 
THE LORD OF THE DUNDERBERG 
 
 GOBLIN and kobold and elf and gnome 
 Riot and rollick and make their home 
 Deep in the Highlands, where Hudson glides, 
 Curving the sweep of his volumed tides 
 Round wooded islet and granite base 
 Down through the rush of the Devil s Race. 
 Great is the prowess of Goblin might; 
 Dread is the malice of troll and sprite; 
 Chief of them all is the potent Dwerg, 
 Heer of the Keep of the Dunderberg! 
 
 [421 
 
Mountain and River obey his spell 
 E en to the Island of Pollopel; 
 Brooding, he sits in the rugged glen, 
 Jealous of honor of sprites and men. 
 Ye who would sail his dominions through 
 Scatheless, withhold not the homage due! 
 Lower your peak and its flaunting flag! 
 Strike! to the Lord of the Thunder Crag! 
 
 Gracefully rounded and broad of beam, 
 Breasting the calms of the golden stream, 
 Slanting along o er the Tappan Rack, 
 Sidled the Geertruyd van liaagensack. 
 Sometimes she wobbled, for, be it told, 
 Casked in the darks of her roomy hold 
 Gurgled the liquor of pleasant sin 
 Rum of Jamaica and Holland s gin! 
 
 Puffing his pipe on the after-deck 
 Glowered the captain, Gerard us Keck 
 Sour and headstrong, but stout of soul, 
 Scorner of legends of spuke and troll. 
 Up came the boatswain with pallid face: 
 "Captain! we swing in the Devil s Race! 
 
 [43] 
 
Will ye not lower the orange flag 
 
 Here, in the shade of the Thunder Crag? 
 
 "Dikkop! Bemoeial!" the captain roared; 
 
 "Durfniet! the wrath of thy Goblin Lord 
 
 Lightly I hold as a stoup of rum! 
 
 Broom to the masthead! and let em come!" 
 
 Shrouding the vessel, before they wist, 
 Streamed from the Mountain a curdling mist. 
 Piercing the woof of that leaden veil 
 Pelted and rattled the heavy hail. 
 Hudson arose like a tortured snake, 
 Foaming and heaving; the thunder spake, 
 Rolled from the cliffs, and the lightning played 
 Viciously red through the pallid shade! 
 
 Oh! how the elements howled and wailed! 
 Oh! how the crew of the Geertruyd quailed, 
 Huddling together with starting eyes! 
 For, in the rack, like a swarm of flies, 
 Legions of goblins in doublet and hose 
 Gamboled and frolicked off Anthony s Nose; 
 While on the shuddering masthead sat 
 Cross-legged, crowned with his steeple-hat, 
 Grinning with mischief, that potent Dwerg, 
 Lord of the Keep of the Dunderberg! 
 
 [44] 
 
Wild was the laughter that quaking men 
 .Heara, through the might from the Goblin* Glen. 
 
Brawled o er the gunwale the frothing tide. 
 "Up with the cargo!" the captain cried; 
 "Lighten the vessel or else we sink!" 
 Over the side went the precious drink! 
 Darting like swallows, those goblin knaves 
 Caught up the casks ere they touched the waves. 
 Back to their mountains the thievish crew 
 Whirled with their booty; before them flew, 
 Waving in triumph a captured flag, 
 He of the Heights of the Thunder Crag! 
 
 Gone was the tempest! With sails adroop, 
 Battered and draggled, the plundered sloop, 
 Stemming a current without a swell, 
 Crept past the Island of Pollopel. 
 Wild was the laughter that quaking men 
 Heard through the night from the Goblin Glen 
 Where, in a revel, the gleeful horde 
 Drank to the fame of their puissant Lord! 
 
 Skippers that scoff when the sky is bright, 
 
 Heed ye this story of goblin might! 
 
 Strange the adventures of barks that come 
 
 Laden with cargoes of gin and rum! 
 
 When the Storm Ship drives with her head to gale 
 And the corpse-light gleams in her hollow sail 
 
 [47] 
 
When Cro Nest laughs in the tempest s hem 
 While the lightnings weave him a diadem 
 When Storm King shouts through the spumy 
 
 wrack 
 
 And Bull Hill bellows the thunder back 
 Beware of the wrath of the mighty Dwerg! 
 Strike flag to the Lord of the Dunderberg! 
 
 [48] 
 
THUNDER-STORM 
 
 The smiths of the heavens are mending the weather; 
 Their hammers are beating the fragments together. 
 The cumulus mountains with nebulous gorges 
 Are dazzled with flame of the wind-bellow sed forges; 
 The cloud-pillared anvils with silvery edges 
 Resound to the thunderous fall of the sledges; 
 Till broadening patches of azure are showing 
 Storm-welded, rain-tempered^ and, splendidly glow 
 ing, 
 
 The rainbow, from valley to valley extended, 
 Proclaims to the world that the weather is mended. 
 
 [49] 
 
A LEGEND OF MAIDEN LANE 
 
 r PO this day the narrow, devious line of Maiden 
 * Lane follows the course of the lost rivulet in 
 whose clear pool the maidens of New Amsterdam 
 were wont to wash the family linen, and along 
 whose wooded banks they often strolled on sum 
 mer evenings with the right sort of company. The 
 abrupt ascent of the land along Nassau Street to 
 the southward preserves the memory of the steep 
 hill on the crest of which stood Jan Vinge s wind 
 mill, while the more gradual slope to the north 
 commemorates the Klaaver Waytie, or clover 
 meadow of the Jan Jansen Damen farm. 
 
 Of all the romances that cluster around "T* 
 Maegde-Padtje," or "The Maiden s Path," none 
 [50] 
 
is of greater interest than that preserved in the 
 records of an old New York family, which tell 
 how the founder of the house was once in that green 
 lane sorely tempted of the devil, of how he was 
 strengthened to resist temptation, and of the good 
 fortune that was granted him. 
 5 
 
A LEGEND OF MAIDEN LANE 
 
 TwAS dusk in the dale, but the clover-clad hill 
 Was rosy in twilight; the sails of the mill 
 Were moving slow shadows o er hillocks of corn 
 And barley; the cadence of Gabriel s horn 
 Old Gabriel Cropsey s proclaimed to his cows 
 The close of their hour to idle and browse; 
 When, down the deep vale that the rivulet made 
 A gladness of shallow and rill and cascade, 
 There tramped a tall youth in a study profound, 
 His hands in his pockets, his eyes on the ground, 
 
 [5*1 
 
Unheeding the buttercups raised for the dew, 
 Unheeding the herdsman s full-throated halloo, 
 Unheeding the large-eyed reproach of the cows. 
 The droop of the hat o er the puckering brows, 
 The stoop of the shoulders and head, made it clear 
 That something was ailing with Corny van Leer. 
 
 Yes, something was wrong; he was weary and sore 
 With drudging long hours, unthanked, in the store 
 Of Steenwyck the merchant, who smoked in his 
 
 chair, 
 
 Whose coffers were brimming as Corny s were bare, 
 Who dined like a burgher, whose garments were 
 
 brave. 
 
 "The man who is poor might as well be a slave!" 
 Groaned Corny. "Why toil till you re wrinkled 
 
 and gray, 
 
 With wealth all around one ? There must be a way ! 
 Suppose " "Ah, suppose!" purred a voice in his 
 
 ear 
 
 So gently that Corny scarce wondered to hear 
 That echo. He turned; and he saw, or he dreamed, 
 A tall, swarthy Person, whose jetty eyes gleamed 
 Quite kindly. A beaver he wore on his head; 
 His cloak and his doublet were sable and red; 
 
 [53] 
 
His breeches (of brimstone) seemed meagerly lined, 
 And yet they projected most queerly behind! 
 
 "Suppose, my good lad" (ah! those accents were 
 
 bland!) 
 
 "Suppose, my dear Corny, you had at command 
 A few paltry guilders? What wealth could be 
 
 made 
 
 By dabbling a bit in the Indian trade! 
 Now look ye! Old Steenwyck has silver to spare, 
 And most of it won by your labor, I ll swear; 
 Suppose that you borrow a handful or so 
 A fortnight? I warrant you, he ll never know; 
 And trust me, I ve proved it too often to doubt 
 The one thing that s wrongful is being found out. 
 Besides, when youVe made eighty guilders of ten 
 (I ll show you the way), you ll repay them again. 
 
 "So" Hark! what a melody toned in his ear! 
 What rich, golden laughter, so merry and clear 
 That bluebird and oriole wakened, and sang 
 A duo to answer the copse whence it rang! 
 It rose like a fountain that bursts through the snow; 
 It fell like the waterfall bubbling below; 
 
 [54] 
 
Twas thrushes and bobolinks greeting the sun 
 That shines through the raindrops when showers 
 
 are done; 
 
 A breath of the hills to the mist-clouded plain, 
 It swept the black fog from his heart and his brain. 
 Clear-eyed and erect, to the Shape at his right 
 He turned but the Tempter had vanished from 
 
 sight! 
 
 Still rippling with merriment, out from the dell 
 Of hazels came Maritje Bleecker to tell 
 How, seeing a youth who was everywhere known 
 For gladness and jollity, brooding alone 
 In gloomy despair of the somberest hue, 
 She laughed, as who wouldn t? He d better laugh, 
 too! 
 
 An ocean of silver the heavens poured down 
 On the queer, gabled roofs of our dear, fabled town 
 As, home through the meadows, in moonlight 
 
 and shade, 
 
 They wandered together, a man and a maid. 
 But all that was spoken the world may not know; 
 The pathways were narrow, their voices were low, 
 
 [55] 
 
And no one o erheard but the Crickets and Elves; 
 That s all. You may finish the story yourselves. 
 
 Yet, this is to add; tis a maxim of cheer 
 Preserved in the tomes of the House of Van Leer: 
 "Of Naught is ye Duyvil soe deeply affray d 
 As a sweete, wholesome Laugh from ye Hearte of 
 a Mayde!" 
 
 [56] 
 
A SONG IN JUNE 
 
 On a rosebush that grows in the garden you love 
 There are three opening buds on a single green 
 stem; 
 
 And they dream as they nod to your window above 
 That it would not be June if it were not for them. 
 
 There s an oriole brave as a prince on his throne 
 In his orange-and-black in the mulberry-tree. 
 
 As he flutes to a world that he knows for his own, 
 "Oh, it would not be June if it were not for me!" 
 
 [571 
 
Let the oriole sing to the earth and the sky, 
 And the roses unfold to the kiss of the dew! 
 
 But the light of my soul is the glance of your eye. 
 And it would not be June if it were not 
 for you. 
 
 fsl 
 
THE RATTLE-WATCH OF NEW 
 AMSTERDAM 
 
 "TJ VEN in quiet New Amsterdam laws were made 
 ^ to be broken, and as a corollary it was needful 
 to establish a police force. The code that required 
 enforcement included ordinances against fast driv 
 ing, against shooting game within the city limits, 
 against righting with knives, against allowing pigs 
 and goats to roam unrestrained through the metro 
 politan streets, as well as regulations governing 
 the liquor traffic. 
 
 The police force consisted of a Ratelwacht of 
 six men who were required to go about the city 
 at night calling out the hour, evidently so that 
 sleeping citizens might know it was not yet time 
 to wake, and sounding their rattles, presumably 
 to give the evil-intentioned due warning of their 
 approach. 
 
 Among the many regulations prescribing what 
 these guardians of the peace should and should not 
 do was one providing that: "Whatever any of the 
 
 [59] 
 
Watch shall get from any of the prisoners, whether 
 lock-up money, present or other fee, which those 
 of the Watch shall receive by consent of the Bur 
 gomasters, it shall be brought into the hands of 
 the Captain for the benefit of the fellow-watchmen 
 and shall be there preserved until divided around." 
 A worthy rule, doubtless as rigorously followed in 
 those early times as to-day. 
 
THE RATTLE-WATCH OF NEW 
 AMSTERDAM 
 
 ! Rrr! Rrr! Rrr!" 
 
 Hark to the rattle s discordant swell! 
 "Ten is the hour and all is well!" 
 Musket on shoulder and dirk on thigh, 
 Forth from the fort, with a soulful sigh, 
 Wiping their lips of a parting dram, 
 Sally the Watch of New Amsterdam. 
 Smite with your rattles the startled ear! 
 Let every miscreant know you re near. 
 Bellow the hour to the sentry moon! 
 Some honest burgher might wake too soon. 
 Come, merry lover of sights and sounds, 
 Follow the Watch on their nightly rounds! 
 
 Marching as though to the roll of drums, 
 Here little Stoffel the tailor comes, 
 Drunk as a hero on musty ale, 
 Waving an arm like a windmill sail, 
 
Threat ning our lives with his weighty goose! 
 Bundle him off to the calaboose! 
 
 "Hola! Friend Watchman!" "Well, what s the 
 
 need?" 
 
 "Sailors afighting! Oh, come with speed! 
 Fighting with knives on the Water Street!" 
 "Down on the river? That s off my beat; 
 You go, young Joris; yet, hark ye, boy, 
 Meddling with tars is a mad employ. 
 Wait till they ve done, like a youth of brains, 
 Then, to the lock-up with what remains!" 
 
 "Ho, Doktor Kierstede! I take my vow 
 Here on the highway I find thy sow, 
 Never a ring in her nose, I say, 
 Rooting the road in a shameful way, 
 Plainly defying the statute " (Clink!) 
 "Hsh! here s the captain! No, I don t drink, 
 Not while on duty; it isn t right. 
 (Thank ye, Heer Doktor.) Good night! Good 
 night!" 
 
 "Softly! We ll capture the wicked wight! 
 You to the left, Dirck, and Jan to right, 
 
Pieter in front of him, I behind! 
 
 Ha! have we caught thee, thou varlet blind? 
 
 Little thou thoughtest our eyes would mark 
 
 Stealers of cabbages in the dark! 
 
 Now in the pillory shalt thou stand 
 
 Holding a cabbage in either hand, 
 
 Yea, and a third on thy cabbage head 
 
 Thief of the Dominie s cabbage-bed!" 
 
 Thus in the days that are called "of yore," 
 Terror of caitiffs, a gallant corps 
 Guarded our city for noble pay: 
 Twenty-four stuyvers per night or day 
 (Forty-eight cents to our modern thrift), 
 One or two beavers by way of gift, 
 And, in the winter, twas understood, 
 Three hundred fagots of firewood. 
 Wouldn t it stagger the budget-roll 
 If our patrolmen were paid in coal! 
 
 [65] 
 
MI N ETTA WATER 
 (The Song of the Buried Stream) 
 
 Deer-hoof dint and moccasin print 
 
 Stamped the moss that rimmed my flow; 
 
 Adder s -tongue and fragrant mint 
 Grew where nothing now may grow; 
 
 Dragon-flies in shimmering schools 
 
 Reveled here, an airy rout; 
 Minnows rilled my glimmering pools, 
 
 Through my rapids flashed the trout. 
 
 Gone the hunter, fled the deer; 
 
 All the birds I loved are flown; 
 Men have hid my waters clear 
 
 Under piles of rigid stone. 
 
 Men have tombed my silver springs; 
 
 Yet, within the sunless caves 
 All unheard my torrent sings. 
 
 All unseen I pour my waves. 
 [66] 
 
Mocking, delving, deep I lurk. 
 
 What! they dream my fount is dry? 
 Lo! I ruin all their work. 
 
 Mortal, they; but deathless, /. 
 
 Let them hold their gloomy day! 
 
 I that laugh shall rule at last. 
 When the massive walls decay, 
 
 When the towers to earth are cast, 
 
 I shall flash a clearer sun, 
 I shall lure my birds again; 
 
 Deep in bloom my streams shall run 
 Through the crumbled homes of men. 
 
SLEEPY HOLLOW 
 
 SOME day let it be in the apple-blossom sea 
 son or else in early October when the Palisades 
 across the river are ablaze with changing leaves 
 make your little pilgrimage through the loveliest 
 country in the world to the old churchyard of 
 Tarrytown where the sunny-hearted enchanter 
 whose spell forever hallows the valley of the Hud 
 son lies asleep. Although time has wrought cruel 
 changes in the neighboring town, you will find 
 that the little secluded nook by the Pocantico is 
 [68] 
 
yet subject to the drowsy influence that pervaded 
 it in the days of Geoffrey Crayon and Diedrich 
 Knickerbocker. 
 
 In reference to the cause of the slumberous at 
 mosphere of the Hollow the great chronicler of 
 New Amsterdam rather dubiously observes, "Some 
 say that the place was bewitched by a High Ger 
 man doctor, during the early days of the settle 
 ment; others, that an old Indian chief, the prophet 
 or wizard of his tribe, held his powwows there." 
 
 Should any ardent controversialists quarrel in 
 behalf of one or the other of these alternative ex 
 planations, they are like to find themselves in the 
 plight of the two opinionated knights who met in 
 mortal combat upon the question of whether the 
 shield was silver or gold, only to learn as they 
 lay dying of their wounds that one side was of 
 the yellow metal, the other of the white. So, lest 
 any such foul debate arise to break the sacred 
 peace of the Hollow, do I tell this true tale of 
 its bewitching, learned on one of many tarryings 
 in the enchanted region. 
 
 69] 
 
SLEEPY HOLLOW 
 
 TWAS in the drowsy Moon of Falling Leaves, 
 And waning summer gave a softer glow, 
 
 And apples dropped, and hosts of yellow sheaves 
 Were bravely tented where Pocantico 
 
 Devolves his lazy waters through the nave 
 Of sunny hills, and past the silent peak 
 
 That casts a somber shadow o er the cave 
 Of Maqua, Wizard of the Wecquaesgeek 
 
 When, up the winding way from Hudson s shore, 
 Came Doktor Nebelhut, the German Sage, 
 
 To sound the fountains of forbidden lore 
 In mystic council with the Forest Mage. 
 
 Above the Wizard s portal, huge and hard, 
 A balanced crag had worn itself a place 
 
 When rocked by winter tempests deeply scarred 
 With dumb inscriptions of a vanished race; 
 
 [70] 
 
And long that rugged sentinel had viewed 
 The sylvan peace of Hudson s rolling glades, 
 
 The River s breadth of silver solitude, 
 The furrowed grandeur of his Palisades. 
 
 Within the crypt discoursed the Sages twain, 
 In fellowship of craft and eager zest 
 
 As if from one deep chalice they would drain 
 The mingled wizardry of East and West 
 
 Of charms to bring the butter to the churn, 
 Of spells to call the red deer from the wold, 
 
 Love philters, incantations to discern 
 
 The haunted hiding-place of pirate gold; 
 
 Dark, awful runes that might not be expressed, 
 Dread weirds, the thought of which is deadly sin! 
 
 And now the Doktor drew from out his vest 
 A quaintly fashioned pouch of cobra-skin. 
 
 "This holds," said he, "a leaf that giveth calm 
 Yea, even as thy fragrant-fuming weed 
 
 But, blent with mandragora s potent balm 
 And soothing essence of the poppy-seed, 
 
 [71] 
 
"When I do blow its azure vapor forth 
 In melting wreaths, o er valley, plain, and hill, 
 
 Who breathes it east or west or south or north 
 Shall droop in childlike slumber at my will!" 
 
 The Red Man s cheek was wrinkled in a smile: 
 "A mighty medicine, O Friend, is thine! 
 
 And dare I tell to thee the simple wile 
 We learn amid the whispers of the pine? 
 
 "Then hear! The willow s ruddy bark I burn 
 Within my pipe. Upon the coal I fling 
 
 These russet seedlets, brushed from plumes of fern 
 In moonlight by the howlet s velvet wing. 
 
 "Within the bowl the crimson sparkle gleams! 
 
 Upon the air the hazy fillets rise! 
 Who scents that cloud shall drowse in wondrous 
 
 dreams, 
 
 While I shall walk unseen of mortal eyes!" 
 
 Then half in pique, "Well spoke!" the Doktor said, 
 "My swarthy Brother! Prithee, let us show 
 
 Our magic s force!" The Wizard bowed his head. 
 The pipes were lit; and upward-rolling slow 
 
 [72] 
 
From creamy meerschaum, waif of Graecia s wave, 
 And dark red sandstone dug of prairie fells, 
 
 The heavy incense filled the narrow cave, 
 
 And outward surging, veiled the golden dells. 
 
 Throughout the vale, where er that vapor crept, 
 The busy farmer dozed beside his wain; 
 
 The housewife in the dairy sighed, and slept; 
 The fisher let his line unheeded strain; 
 
 The bronze-limbed hunter slacked his arching bow; 
 
 The deer forgot to leap, the hawk to fly; 
 The lilies drooped; the hemlock nodded low, 
 
 And every aster closed its purple eye. 
 
 Of them that wrought the marvel ? Strange their 
 plight! 
 
 In vain they strove against the magic hest! 
 Till, smiling each to each a long "Good-night," 
 
 They closed their eyes in twice-enchanted rest. 
 
 And e en the sentry boulder knew the charm; 
 
 Awhile it quivered like a blade of grass, 
 Then, sliding softly as a sleeper s arm, 
 
 It sealed the cavern with its granite mass. 
 
 [73] 
 
Around that cave the leafy creepers cling, 
 Above its roof in summer, roses blow; 
 
 And o er the mossy portal, in the spring 
 The dogwood pours its avalanche of snow. 
 
 And still they doze the necromantic twain, 
 While from their pipes the witching fumes arise; 
 
 And still, when Indian Summer bows the grain, 
 That eery vapor dims the tender skies. 
 
 And still the valley lies beneath a spell; 
 
 And wondrous clouds and visions they do know 
 Who loiter in the dream-enchanted dell 
 
 That hears the murmur of Pocantico. 
 
 [74] 
 
A SPRINGTIME PILGRIMAGE 
 
 Feet on the hills and heads in the sky, 
 Bathing our brows in the breath of springy 
 
 Buoyant and youthful and clear of eye 
 Over a glorified road we swing. 
 
 Meadows are greening their winter tan, 
 Orchards are heavy with scented snow. 
 
 On! through the Vale of the Nepperhan, 
 Over the Heights of Pocantico! 
 
 Dogwood and laurel and trailing pine 
 Mantle the furrowed and craggy scaurs; 
 
 Creamy dicentra and columbine 
 Nod oer the ashes of buried wars; 
 
 [751 
 
Rebel and Tory have made their bed 
 Harmless, their sabers a truce have found 
 
 Under the verdure that lifts our tread, 
 Deep in the heart of the Neutral Ground. 
 
 (Here is the church on the haunted ridge, 
 Lichens of centuries fleck the sides; 
 
 Shrouded and headless, o er yonder bridge 
 Nightly the Galloping Hessian rides. 
 
 (What though a burden of moldered stones 
 Cover their forms from the eyes of men! 
 
 Ichabod, Baltus, and Big Brom Bones 
 Rise through the magic of Irving s pen.) 
 
 Hudson in majesty meets the sea 
 
 Monarch of mountains and goblin glades; 
 
 Laughing, the ripple of Tappan Zee 
 Mocks at the frown of the Palisades. 
 
 Slumbers the land in a golden spell. 
 
 Hush! The Enchanter hath laid him down, 
 Close by the river he loved so well, 
 
 Here in the Hollow of Tarrytown. 
 
 [76] 
 
A SCANDAL IN NEW AMSTERDAM 
 
 CVERY Saturday morning New Amsterdam 
 ^ was enlivened by the weekly market held 
 at the Strand, or East River water-front, near the 
 house of Dr. Hans Kierstede, which stood on the 
 north side of Pearl Street and the corner of Moore 
 Street, where were the weighing-house and the 
 only little dock in the town. 
 
 Thither came the country-folk from Haarlem, 
 Breuckelen, Vlissingen (Flushing), Hoboken-Hack- 
 ing, Ompoge (Amboy), Ahasimus, and New Utrecht 
 in carts, on horseback, in shallops, canoes, or 
 market-boats which they moored in the Heera 
 Graft or Broad Street canal, bringing their sup 
 plies of veal, pork, butter, cheese, milk, tobacco, 
 peaches, cider, herbs, melons, oysters, shad, chick 
 ens, geese, turkeys, pelicans, eel-shovelers, and 
 quail to exchange for linsey-woolsey cloth, medi 
 cines, arrack, sugar, ribbons, caps, and finery for 
 Sunday wear, clay pipes and like commodities of 
 town life, for Dutch guilders and stuyvers or for 
 
 [77] 
 
Indian sewant or wampum which was the principal 
 circulating medium in the days of Wilhelmus Kieft. 
 Thither came the Indians of Long Island and the 
 Hudson River country with venison and other 
 game and packs of furs and skins beaver, mink, 
 bear, wolf, wildcat, and panther. There gathered 
 the farmers wives and daughters, keen for bar 
 gaining, but just as eager to exchange gossip with 
 the ladies of the city. 
 
 In default of newspapers, all the news of the 
 day passed from mouth to mouth; and if a few 
 choice scandals were thus put in circulation, they 
 were assuredly no worse than many that have 
 been whispered at the tea-drinkings of later days. 
 The scandal referred to in the title is embalmed 
 in New Amsterdam s early records of litigation. 
 
A SCANDAL IN NEW AMSTERDAM 
 
 ACROSS the inlet s ebb and rise 
 The spotless houses glare surprise 
 From all their gable-hooded eyes 
 
 On motley, mingling craft 
 The light canoe from wilds remote, 
 The blunt bateau and market-boat, 
 And shallop, dugout, skiff, and float 
 
 Within "Die Heere Graft." 
 
 The bronze Mohegan brings the spoil 
 Of wood and river; what the soil 
 Hath yielded to his sturdy toil, 
 
 With plaintive calf and lamb 
 The farmer hales in groaning dray 
 Along the forest-bordered way, 
 For this is held a market day 
 
 In fair New Amsterdam. 
 
 Like finches, round the market-boats 
 The rosy vrouws, with kerchiefed throats 
 And short but ample petticoats 
 
 [79] 
 
And hoods and kirtles gay, 
 Are gathering and scattering 
 And chaffering and chattering, 
 The Ninth Commandment shattering; 
 
 Then hark to what they say! 
 
 "Thou coppery knave with the cloven ear! 
 Pray, what is thy charge for this puny deer? 
 Twelve stuyvers in wampum! As I m alive 
 Such venison wouldn t be cheap at five! 
 You savages, verily, grow too bold; 
 Dost fancy our burghers are made of gold? 
 Go! Take it away to thy woods again! 
 Eleven thou sayest? I ll give thee ten." 
 
 "Ah, Mevrouw von Blarcom! we meet again! 
 What news from the village of Vlissingen? 
 Soh! Adrian Joostan is gone at last! 
 Poor man; tis a mercy his woes are past. 
 Yea? Journeyed to Hartford hath Pieter Volck! 
 How reckless to trust to the Yankee folk! 
 Nay, little of moment hath passed in town. 
 The governor s dame hath a silken gown. 
 Hast heard of the strife twixt our Dominie 
 Bogardus and Antony Jan Salee? 
 
 [so] 
 
"The trouble was started, so all avow, 
 By Anneke Jansen, the Dominie s vrouw, 
 Who, chatting one Saturday over her tea, 
 Spake somewhat unkindly of Vrouw Salee; 
 Mayhap that her linens were none too clean, 
 Her servants ill-bred, or her larder lean. 
 Whatever she said of her, I ll be bound 
 It lost not a jot as it traveled round; 
 And, truthful or slanderous, let that be, 
 It kindled the wrath of the Vrouw Salee, 
 Who rushed to her friends with a look intense 
 To tell them, in veriest confidence, 
 How, crossing a street of this muddy town, 
 Good Madam Bogardus had raised her gown 
 M-m, higher than prudent. Yea, showed, indeed, 
 Well more of her ankles than there was need! 
 
 "Then such a commotion you never saw! 
 Vrouw Anneke vowed she would have the law. 
 The Dominie sued for his dame (of course 
 Thou knowest the mare is the better horse). 
 The Schepens with sober and solemn face 
 Examined and pondered the weighty case, 
 And sentenced poor Madam Salee to tell 
 In public, at sound of the crier s bell, 
 7 [83] 
 
That falsely she d spoken alack, the shame! 
 And the Dominie s wife was a worthy dame. 
 Moreover, her husband hath sadly paid 
 Three guilders and more for his wife s tirade. 
 
 "Good faith! but our magistrates win applause, 
 So wisely and well they enforce the laws! 
 For truly the tongue is a two-edged sword, 
 And Slander s a monster that stalks abroad, 
 Devouring all with a mouth of flame; 
 And no one is safe from the smudge of blame. 
 (But this is in confidence twixt us two 
 I firmly believe that the tale was true!)" 
 
KISSING BRIDGE 
 
 (Once at the junction of Roosevelt Street and Park Row.} 
 
 No Roebling reared that primal way 
 With web of steel and splendid line; 
 
 Its piers were rubble, crude and gray, 
 Its beams were hewn of forest pine. 
 
 Across the kill that eastward flowed 
 It led, unjarred by rumbling tram, 
 
 Where grasses waved and lilies glowed; 
 New York was then Nieuw Amsterdam. 
 
 With rake and scythe at droop of day, 
 With lilt and carol full and free, 
 
 The maids and younkers hold their way 
 Along the shadowed Bouwerie. 
 
 A playful whisper stirs the trees, 
 A laughing ripple rills the shoal, 
 
 For here, as village law decrees, 
 
 The sweetest lips must pay the toll. 
 
 [85] 
 
Good Saint that loved our isle, restore 
 That hallowed bridge, to span a tide 
 
 With blowing fields on either shore; 
 Let me be there with one beside! 
 
 Dispel this cloud of stone and steel, 
 These clogging mists of tawdry sham! 
 
 Let lips be frank and hearts be leal 
 As then in old Nieuw Amsterdam! 
 
 [86] 
 
0q 
 
 
 
 s: 
 
A TRIAL IN NEW AMSTERDAM 
 
 AN is a quarrelsome animal and his social 
 and political history is largely a record of 
 battles and suits-at-law. 
 
 Dry as some might think them, the records of 
 the Court of Burgomasters and Schepens of New 
 Amsterdam contain the germs of many rare tales 
 and are delightful in their naive gravity. From 
 them one may glean that the good people of the 
 town sometimes failed to pay their taxes; that 
 they sometimes engaged in fisticuffs; that they 
 frequently violated the liquor laws; that they even 
 took unfair advantage of one another in business 
 transactions; and that they were woefully addicted 
 to slander, backbiting, and the calling of evil 
 names in short, that they were very human. 
 
As for the judgments of the primitive court, 
 they were of the Solomonic order. Never did that 
 worthy tribunal walk around the square in order 
 to reach the house next door. Perhaps its de 
 cisions were not monuments of legal erudition, 
 but they were simple, direct, and satisfying to 
 the unscientific lay mind, and in all probability 
 generally made for justice. Witness a case in 
 point. 
 
 90] 
 
A TRIAL IN NEW AMSTERDAM 
 
 YE who have chafed at the law s delays 
 
 And the tedious trials of later days 
 
 Ye who have laughed at the sage pretense 
 
 That ponders ridiculous evidence 
 
 Hear of a process, devoid of sham, 
 
 In the trim little town of New Amsterdam. 
 
 Burgher Jan Haeckius standeth here 
 Claiming his due for a keg of beer 
 Sold on the record this fact stands proven- 
 To crafty Jacobus Van Couwenhouven. 
 Cometh Jacobus, that wily man, 
 Boldly admitting the sale by Jan, 
 Natheless maintaining no pay is due, 
 Seeing the beer is a worthless brew, 
 Muddy of color and flat and sour, 
 Drawn from the vat in an evil hour. 
 Further, he claimeth of startled Jan 
 Gold for redress of his inner man. 
 
 [91] 
 
What did the worshipful Schepens do? 
 Think you they summoned a learned crew 
 Laden with volumes, retorts, and vials 
 Such as bewilder our modern trials? 
 Nothing of ptomaines nor germs knew they; 
 Naught of the microbe that stalks by day; 
 Nothing they knew of those wondrous men 
 Skilled in the slights of the subtle pen. 
 Nothing they knew of our modern shame 
 Perjury sanctioned by Learning s name. 
 The highway to Justice was broad and clear: 
 "Court is adjourned to inspect the beer." 
 
. 
 Out to the open the jury wan 
 
 With doubtful Jacobus and hopeful Jan. 
 Nothing was heard for an hour or twain 
 But mellow gurgles, the soft refrain 
 Of deep-drawn breathing and smack of zest 
 That tell of the spirit of man at rest, 
 While the jury, seated along a fence, 
 Absorbed and digested the evidence. 
 
 Seemly the session, though all too short 
 E en for the litigants. Soon the Court 
 Gravely convened at its former stand, 
 Wiping its mouth on the back of its hand, 
 And spake with conviction, as jurors should: 
 "Verdict for plaintiff. Said beer was good." 
 
 [93 
 
ON THE HARLEM 
 
 The hand that ruled the helm was yours, 
 The arm that bent the oar was mine; 
 
 The breeze that blew across the moors 
 Was breath of meadows blent with brine; 
 
 It whirled the reddened leaf along, 
 It stirred your silken-tendriled hair, 
 
 It teased the wave to rill in song, 
 It played upon my shoulders bare. 
 
 In time with even dip and swing 
 And crisp of feathered oars aslant, 
 
 We roused the crags where laurels cling 
 With Eton s mellow rowing-chant. 
 
 [94] 
 
So down that sparkling reach we came 
 On keel of cedar, silver-shod, 
 
 Our bows aglow with leaves aflame 
 And gunwale-deep in goldenrod. 
 
 [95] 
 
WILLIAM THE TESTY 
 
 \X7ILHELMUS KIEFT is generally admitted 
 * to have been the worst of the Dutch gov 
 ernors of New York; and, even waiving his minor 
 faults and offenses, he undoubtedly deserves that 
 bad eminence because of his cruelty and perfidy 
 which brought upon the settlement the most ter 
 rible of the Indian wars that hampered its growth. 
 Still it is to be remembered in his favor that he 
 maintained the city s basic traditions of tolerance 
 and hospitality by welcoming fugitives from re 
 ligious bigotry, such as Lady Deborah Moody, 
 from less liberal New England; and also it is well 
 to bear in mind that Washington Irving s lively 
 caricature of the peppery little Director in his 
 brimstone breeches was actually a satire on Thomas 
 
 [96] 
 
Jefferson. For fear that I may be accused of fol 
 lowing too closely in Irving s footsteps by like 
 wise applying the past to the immediate present, 
 I must plead that the following ballad was written 
 and printed in the year 1900. 
 
 97 
 
WILLIAM THE TESTY 
 
 AFAR in the ages of quaint renown 
 
 There ruled o er the germ of this mighty town 
 
 A potentate, famed for a wondrous knack 
 
 Of breeding dissension and brewing wrack. 
 
 Oh, he was a tart little pepper-pot! 
 
 A simmering kettle, forever hot! 
 
 A hedgehog abristle with puissant ire, 
 
 A little volcano of smothered fire; 
 
 Forever intruding a muddling hand 
 
 In matters beyond him to understand, 
 
 Upsetting the work of a dozen men 
 
 And fuming and fussing enough for ten. 
 
 A meddlesome, quarrelsome, peevish sprite, 
 
 He bustled and bickered from dawn till night. 
 
 He troubled his folk with a hundred griefs; 
 
 He kindled the rage of the savage chiefs, 
 
 And tomahawk, arrow, and brand came down 
 
 Through desolate fields to a mourning town. 
 
 Though skilled in the practice of wordy strife 
 And cursed with a tongue like a poisoned knife, 
 
 [98] 
 
He fronted a foeman of like degree 
 When he blundered afoul of the Dominie. 
 For Parson Bogardus, the stern and leal, 
 Was deeply concerned for the public weal, 
 And loudly he thundered in strong dispraise, 
 Denouncing the governor s evil ways. 
 "The preacher s a sot!" came the fierce retort; 
 "His sermons are stupid and none too short!" 
 Small wonder, forsooth, that the parson dinned 
 His wrath from the pulpit: "Ach! Duyvil s kind! 
 Defamer of righteousness!" then a roar 
 "My goats are as good as the governor!" 
 The magistrate s vengeance was swift and fell; 
 He marshaled his troops at the stroke of bell, 
 And vainly the Dominie strove to cheer 
 The sinning and sorrowful; every ear 
 W T ith drum-roll and trumpet and martial sound 
 W T as filled, and the sermon was wholly drowned! 
 
 The burghers, aghast at the wild debate 
 And utter disruption of Church and state, 
 Deported the disputants out of hand 
 To settle their feud in the fatherland. 
 The governor burdened the vessel s hold 
 With marvelous treasure of goblin gold 
 8 [99] 
 
Achieved under starlight and lantern-glow 
 In the mystical mines of the Ramapo. 
 Thus laden, the vessel was tempest tossed, 
 And parson and governor both were lost! 
 Yet there is a legend in hut and hall 
 That Governor Kieft wasn t drowned at all! 
 But, spirited off with his fairy gold, 
 He drowses and dreams in a mountain hold 
 Like Arthur, or Ogier the lordly Dane, 
 Some day to return to his own domain. 
 
 And now when a bickering breaks the gloom 
 And wakens old ghosts in the mayor s room, 
 When portly commissioners dread the ban 
 That darts from the orbs of a mighty man, 
 When frightened attendants stand quaking by 
 And browbeat petitioners turn and fly, 
 Methinks he hath come to his home once more 
 The stanch little burgh on the Hudson s shore; 
 Tis William the Testy, no modern sham, 
 That governs the town of New Amsterdam! 
 
 f 100 
 
THE ROAD 
 
 My way of life is a winding road, 
 
 A road that wanders, yet turns not back. 
 
 Where one should go with as light a load 
 As well may be in a traveler s pack; 
 
 A road that rambles through marsh and wood, 
 Meadow and waste, to the cloudy end; 
 
 But, smooth or rugged, I find it good, 
 For something s always around the bend. 
 
 There may be storms in the bleak defiles, 
 But oh, the calm of the valley s breast! 
 
 There may be toil on the upward miles, 
 But oh, the joy of the mountain-crest! 
 
 And here s a thistle and there s a rose, 
 And next whatever the road may send; 
 
 For onward ribbons the way I chose. 
 
 With something always around the bend. 
 [101] 
 
Then come, and travel my road with me 
 Through windy passes or waves of flowers! 
 
 Though long and weary the march may be, 
 The rover s blessing shall still be ours: 
 
 "A noonday halt at a crystal well, 
 
 A word and smile with a passing friend, 
 
 A song to sing and a tale to tell, 
 
 And something coming around the bend!" 
 
 102 ] 
 
THE PIRATE S SPUKE 
 
 TN 1612 Captain Adrian Block established a 
 * trading-post on the island of Manhattan, and 
 two years later, in the Onrust or Restless, a stout 
 craft of native pine, the first ship ever launched 
 in the waters of New York, he set forth on his 
 memorable voyage of exploration along the eastern 
 shore of the island into the unknown Sound. 
 On the figurative map of his expedition that he 
 caused to be made, "Hellegatt" appears as the 
 name of the arm of the sea that we now call the 
 East River; and it is evident that the patriotic 
 captain named the strait in honor of "De Helle 
 gatt," that is, "the bright or beautiful pass," a 
 stream that flows into the West Schelde through 
 the southern part of his own province of Zeeland, 
 that nurse of hardy sailors. But after sundry 
 Dutch skippers had met with trouble and disaster 
 among the rocks, whirlpools, and currents off" Hal- 
 let s Point, they testily changed the name to 
 "Hel-gatt," or, as we make it, "Hell Gate," con- 
 [103] 
 
fining the application of that ominous title to the 
 region of danger. 
 
 Now it is notorious that the devil never declines 
 an invitation, and from that moment the passage 
 became a veritable picnic-ground for all the imps; 
 and its rocks the Hog s Back, the Hen and 
 Chickens, the Frying-pan and the Pot were the 
 scene of many an infernal revel until the spirits of 
 
 [104] 
 
evil were exorcised by the potent charm of dyna 
 mite in 1876. 
 
 The identity of a dreadful apparition, the pirate s 
 spuke, or ghost, that haunted Hell Gate until 
 shot with a silver bullet by Governor Peter 
 Stuyvesant, has long been a matter of dispute. 
 The infant colony of New Amsterdam was visited 
 by many pirates, such as Captain Sebastian de 
 Raeff, and doubtless some of these perished in the 
 wild tide-rush of the East River in their attempts 
 to reach the town through the treacherous channel. 
 Perhaps the ghost was that of Captain de Raeff 
 himself, perhaps it was that of his lieutenant, Jan 
 van Campen; perhaps but the secret is lost be 
 neath the foam of Hell Gate. 
 
 [105] 
 
THE PIRATE S SPUKE 
 
 LEAVE the dull present, to seek awhile 
 The little Dutch burgh on Manhattan Isle 
 Under that ruler of adamant, 
 Sturdy old Governor Stuyvesant. 
 Here is a circle of broad-backed men 
 Harking, while Trumpeter Pietersen 
 Opens a budget of wondrous lore 
 Of the deeds of the doughty old governor; 
 Sings him triumphant o er man and elf; 
 Yea (whisper low!), o er the Duyvil himself! 
 
 In the rock-toothed strait where the three tides meet 
 
 Ye may cast your lines at will 
 While the sun is high in an honest sky 
 
 And the ravening wave is still; 
 
 But ware the reefs! under midnight s roof 
 
 When the roaring eddies swell! 
 For the rocks are marked with the cloven hoof 
 
 And the smut of the brands of hell. 
 [106] 
 
Like a slavered wolf the torrent moans 
 And raves through deeps and shoals; 
 
 The air is filled with the warning groans 
 And wails of perished souls; 
 
 And the Duyvil squats on the Hog s Back high 
 When the angry cloud-banks form, 
 
 And his fiddle squalls to the murky sky 
 In hail of the brewing storm. 
 
 So he snareth fish for his grimy clan, 
 And the foaming brine brawls hot 
 
 As he griddles his prey on the Frying-pan 
 Or seethes it in the Pot! 
 
 All day a sun of sullen red 
 
 Through mists had glowered down; 
 
 That night twas inky black o erhead 
 And a wild wind smote the town. 
 
 The March sky broke with a crashing roar, 
 
 But never a raindrop fell; 
 And a dreadful laugh shook the eastern shore 
 
 The mirthless laugh of hell! 
 
 [107] 
 
There, in the curd of the churning vat 
 Where naught of earth could float, 
 
 A black-faced, scar-browed seaman sat 
 In the stern of a tossing boat. 
 
 He wore a scarf at his evil throat, 
 
 And the hat of a picaroon, 
 And every boss of his blue sea-coat 
 
 Was a shining gold doubloon. 
 
 His belt of net with pistolet 
 And burnished dirk was hung; 
 
 The thunder s growl and tempest s howl 
 Waxed louder as he sung: 
 
 "Oh, golden Main and fleets of Spain! 
 
 No more my chests ye fill, 
 For here I stay till Judgment Day 
 
 To work my Master s will!" 
 
 Out stumped our stanch old governor, 
 
 A musket in his hand: 
 "Now get thee gone, thou devil s spawn, 
 
 Nor longer vex my land!" 
 fioSl 
 
"Oh, I may not go and I will not go," 
 
 That girding goblin cried, 
 "While the trade-winds blow and the salt waves 
 
 flow 
 
 And the white moon rules the tide." 
 
 "Thou wretched fry! wouldst thou defy 
 
 My will with tawdry spell? 
 Thou thing unclean, thou ghoul obscene, 
 
 Hence! hie thee back to hell!" 
 
 "Oh, silver and gold, and silver and gold! 
 
 Rich, rich my Master s fee! 
 So here I ride, whate er betide, 
 
 Until he looseth me." 
 
 The governor raised his musket true 
 And aimed through spume and brine: 
 
 "Dost silver crave, thou losel knave? 
 Then take this gift of mine!" 
 
 The bullet was cast of the silver bright; 
 
 Twas blessed by the Dominie 
 With a mystic word and it smote that sprite 
 
 In the place where a heart should be. 
 
 [109] 
 
A cry like the scream of a dying horse, 
 
 A flurry of smoke and flame 
 Of lurid red and the phantom fled 
 
 To the place from whence he came. 
 
 The great wind sank to a maiden s prayer, 
 
 The guttural thunder died, 
 The moonbeam dropped through a crystal air 
 
 To dance on a dimpling tide. 
 
 And the strait is free of the fiendish art 
 
 And the power of goblins ill, 
 For they fear the wrath of a fearless heart 
 
 And the force of an iron will. 
 
 no] 
 
STORM SIGNALS 
 
 Cloud-wreath, mist-sheath, 
 
 Burr about the moon, 
 A dawn of red, a vault of lead: 
 
 A storm s a-coming soon. 
 
 Sea-gull, free gull 
 
 Flit across the sand: 
 A dirty sea there 1 s sure to be 
 
 When you re upon the land. 
 
 Mare s tails, mare s tails 
 
 Sweep a mackerel sky: 
 Oh, reef your sail before the gale 
 
 The foam is bound to fly! 
 
A DEAL IN REAL ESTATE 
 
 "\ 1 7HILE the early history of the colonies on 
 * * Manhattan was stained by several cruel 
 Indian wars, the relations between the Dutch 
 settlers and the aborigines were generally not un 
 pleasant, and, despite the fact that the pale-face 
 had an uncomfortable habit of getting the best of 
 the bargain, there are many instances of warm 
 friendships between red and white. 
 
 [112] 
 
A DEAL IN REAL ESTATE 
 
 BARENDT CUYLER, Indian trader, 
 Shrewd, but honest as the light, 
 
 Merry-hearted, wise, and witty, 
 Loved alike by red and white, 
 
 Sat and pondered in the sunshine, 
 Puffing at his pipe the while, 
 
 Where the brawling Spuyten Duyvil 
 Foams on Mannahatta s Isle. 
 
 Arrow-swift, a birchen vessel 
 Shot across the winding creek; 
 
 Up the bank strode Wetamoset, 
 Sachem of the Weckquaesgeek. 
 
 "Hail!" the Dutchman called in greeting. 
 
 "Hail!" the crested chief replied, 
 Gracious as a king in exile. 
 
 Pipe to pipe and side by side, 
 
Long they smoked in friendly silence, 
 
 Gazing on the rapid stream, 
 Till the chieftain softly murmured, 
 
 "Wetamoset dreamed a dream." 
 
 "Tell thy dream." Then quoth the sachem, 
 
 Guileless as a babe new-born, 
 "Wetamoset dreamed his brother 
 
 Gave him gun and powder-horn." 
 
 Grave and silent, Barendt Cuyler 
 
 Sought his cabin s open door, 
 Filled a horn with large-grained powder, 
 
 Chose a musket from his store, 
 
 Gave them to the stolid chieftain, 
 
 Who, with courteous ado, 
 Bearing off the light-won plunder 
 
 Launched again his light canoe. 
 
 Wetamoset, sage and war-chief, 
 Stood before his lodge at morn; 
 
 Dark behind him rose his woodland, 
 Green before him waved his corn. 
 
Mosholu to Spuyten Duyvil 
 Poured a rill of liquid light; 
 
 Up the slope came Barendt Cuyler, 
 Loved alike by red and white. 
 
 Full and friendly was his welcome, 
 Long he tarried there, to speak 
 
 Pleasant words of kindly counsel 
 For the folk of Weckquaesgeek. 
 
 Then, beneath his eyebrow s shadow 
 Flashed and danced a mirthful gleam; 
 
 Spoke the trader: "Wetamoset, 
 Barendt Cuyler dreamed a dream." 
 
 "Let him tell it." Then the trader: 
 "Cuyler, sleeping by the lin, 
 
 Dreamed that Wetamoset gave him 
 All of Papparinamin!" 
 
 Ruefully the stately sachem 
 
 Viewed the province of that dream, 
 All the pleasant island-meadow 
 
 Twixt the marshland and the stream. 
 9 [115] 
 
Arm in air, he traced the boundary, 
 Wooded height and reedy shore: 
 
 "All that land is thine, my brother. 
 Brother let us dream no more!" 
 
 [116] 
 
POSSESSION 
 
 When soft I lay in the mossy bed 
 
 That swells to the foot of the hemlock-tree , 
 
 In the pride of a lover s heart I said, 
 " The sweety green woods belong to me!" 
 
 But the woodchuck gray and the brown-eyed doe 
 And the chipmunk, rocked on the hazel stem, 
 
 And the hare and the deermouse answered, "No!"~ 
 The sweety green woods belonged to them! 
 
 Then the jack-in-the-pulpits, friends of youth, 
 Looked archly out from their purpling hoods 
 
 With an elfin laugh as they told the truth: 
 "We all belong to the sweet, green woods!" 
 
WIZARD S WELL 
 
 AT the extreme northwestern end of the island 
 ** of Manhattan, bordered by the broad Hudson 
 and the curving Spuyten Duyvil, rises the promon 
 tory that a few still call by its ancient name of 
 Cock Hill or Cox s Hill, an untamed region of 
 cliff, ravine, and woodland. Probably from this 
 eminence as well as from the fortified height of 
 Nipnichsen on the Westchester shore across the 
 creek, the Indians of the island first sounded in 
 European ears their fierce war-cry, "Hoach, hoach, 
 ha, ha, hach, woach!" as they shot their arrows 
 and hurled their lances at Henry Hudson s vessel. 
 This is a place brimming over with magic upper, 
 lower, and middle magic. A deep glade, known as 
 The Clove, leads through woods to a little patch 
 of meadow backed by lofty cliffs and opening out 
 upon the Spuyten Duyvil. Here a spring of the 
 purest water flows into the creek, while above it 
 grows a great tulip-tree, by far the largest tree 
 on the island. In a haunted cave still to be seen 
 [118] 
 
under the eastward shadow of the cliffs there 
 once dwelt an ancient Indian medicine-man, 
 hight Moaqua. A kindly old wizard, his counsel 
 was much sought by the rosy maidens of New 
 Haarlem and New Amsterdam on all subjects 
 from matters of the dairy even unto matters of 
 the heart; and before he vanished from mortal 
 eyes in the mysterious manner characteristic of 
 all true wizards, he imparted some of his mystic 
 power to the beautiful spring near his dwelling- 
 place, ever after known as the Wizard s Well. 
 
WIZARD S WELL 
 
 "TRUDCHEN! Trudchen!" teased the maids, 
 Laughed the lads of gallant mien; 
 
 "Leave your gloomy forest glades! 
 Join our dance upon the green!" 
 
 Trudchen never turned her head; 
 
 Light as wind-blown thistledown 
 Up the woodland path she sped 
 
 Far above the step-roofed town. 
 
 "Trudchen! Trudchen!" sang the birds, 
 Called the squirrels, high in air; 
 
 "Here are lilies, white as curds, 
 Velvet moss and maidenhair. 
 
 "Stay with us, oh, Sweet, Sweet, Sweet! 
 
 Play with us, and fear no harm!" 
 Onward flew her constant feet; 
 
 Pause or word had broke the charm. 
 [120] 
 
Light as wind-blown thistle down 
 Up the woodland path she sped. 
 
Soon beside the pool she stood. 
 
 Underneath the cliff-walled hill 
 Shadowed by the ancient wood 
 
 Bordered by the sparkling kill; 
 
 Bending low, with coral mouth 
 Sipped the waters of the well; 
 
 Closed her eyes and faced the south; 
 Wished her wish and spoke the spell: 
 
 "Wizard chief, whose haunted cave 
 Hides where mountain-laurels cling; 
 
 Red Moaqua, thou that gave 
 Secret gifts to bless thy spring, 
 
 "Hear the words my grandam taught! 
 
 Hear the unforgotten spell! 
 Own the charm thy magic wrought! 
 
 Grant the wish I may not tell!" 
 
 Steered where Spuyten Duyvil Kill 
 Drinks of Hudson s ample flow, 
 
 Driven with a lusty will 
 Landward rode the broad bateau. 
 
Rich in peltries, plain and pied, 
 Spoil of beaver, mink, and deer, 
 
 Marten fur and panther hide, 
 Gaily came the pioneer. 
 
 Home! from wilds and craggy caves, 
 Lairs of beasts and savage men. 
 
 "Trudchen! Trudchen!" lisped the waves; 
 "We have brought him home again!" 
 
 Light o er rock and fallen bole 
 
 Leaped the youth in glad surprise; 
 
 Soft behind the girl he stole, 
 Gently kissed the hooded eyes. 
 
 Tulip-tree, whose mighty shade 
 
 Gives the well a deeper hue, 
 Tell the wish that Trudchen made! 
 
 Tell me did that wish come true? 
 
HALLOWE EN CHARM 
 
 Fern seed, hemp seed, water of the welly 
 
 Bark of wizard hazel-wand, berry of the bay, 
 
 Let the fairy gifts of you mingle with the spell. 
 Guard the precious life and soul of him that s far 
 away! 
 
 Oak slip, thorn slip, crystal of the dew, 
 
 Morsel of his native earth, shoot of mountain pine, 
 
 Lend his arm the strength of you, let his eye be true, 
 Send him like the thunderbolt to break thefoeman s 
 line! 
 
 Rose leaf, elm leaf, kernel of the wheat, 
 
 Airy wtft of thistledown, feather of the wren. 
 Bring him peace and happiness, let his dream be 
 
 sweet, 
 
 Take my secret thought to him and call him home 
 again! 
 
 tsl 
 
BORGER JORIS S HAMMER 
 
 YEARLY in the history of New Amsterdam 
 *~* Borger Joris, the smith, set up his forge on 
 the Strand of the East River just below the pali 
 sades of Wall Street, where Hanover Square is 
 to-day. Hearty, patriotic, and pugnacious, he 
 was the last man to stand by Governor Stuyve- 
 sant in his defiance of the English fleet, and left 
 the city in disgust after the surrender. The 
 scene of his youthful adventure, narrated in the 
 following ballad, the Glen of the Little Gray Men, 
 is part of the glade of the wooded Clove at 
 Spuyten Duyvil. 
 
BORGER JORIS S HAMMER 
 
 A LANDHOLDING freeman, a burgher of pith, 
 Is big Borger Joris, New Amsterdam s smith. 
 Just south of the Wall where the ferryboat swings, 
 His forge-fire blazes; his sledge-hammer rings 
 On plowshare, on coulter, on scythe, ax, and bill. 
 He beats the white iron that shapes to his will. 
 Thrice hard were the labors of forest and farm 
 If gone were the skill of that muscular arm. 
 
 The coals of the smithy to ashes have burned; 
 The daylight is ebbing; in leisure well earned 
 The smith s at the doorway, his face to the breeze 
 That blows from the harbor. Young Peter De 
 
 Vries, 
 
 His curly-haired prentice, as eager for play 
 And -chary of work as a boy of to-day 
 Who lounges full-length on the turf at his side, 
 Heaves up the great hammer, stout Jons s pride, 
 And queries, "Good master, now tell me, I pray: 
 You ve wrought on the anvil for many a day 
 
Scythe, horseshoe, and anchor, the great and the 
 
 small, 
 But who forged the hammer that forges them all ?" 
 
 A huge, kindly hand like the paw of a bear 
 Is lost in the youth s tumbled masses of hair 
 As Joris makes answer: "That hammer was new 
 When I was a worthless apprentice like you. 
 But fill me a pipe and a tankard of ale, 
 My lad, and I ll tell you its wonderful tale. 
 
 "In fall when the maples were tinging with red, 
 When goldenrod waved, and the azure overhead 
 Was mellow with haze, like a slip-halter colt 
 I scampered free-footed through meadow and 
 
 holt, 
 
 A truant; far better the fowl-haunted sedge 
 I loved than the anvil, the bellows, and sledge. 
 
 "Well north, on the sweep of the eddying kill 
 That limits our island, arises a hill, 
 A deep-fissured foreland of green-wooded glades 
 Where chestnuts are gathered by Indian maids 
 And cress in the summer. So mild is the air 
 That columbines bloom at the earliest there, 
 [128] 
 
And bobolink chirrups his mellowest staves. 
 Oh, green are its laurels and mossy its caves 
 And clear are its wells may they never run 
 
 dry! 
 You rascal! you know the spot better than I. 
 
 " Twas there that I loitered, too happy for words, 
 To chaff with the squirrels, to chirp to the 
 
 birds, 
 
 To wander, high-souled and adventurous, fain 
 To search every nook of my lovely domain; 
 Then, stretched in the shade of a great tree that 
 
 grows 
 
 Cliff-sheltered, spring-watered, I lay in a doze 
 To dream out my day-dream; when, ringing and 
 
 clear, 
 
 The clink of a forge-hammer smote on my ear, 
 Sore blow to my conscience! I sprang to my 
 
 feet 
 
 And marveled and trembled; it must be a cheat! 
 Yet, no; I saw clearly: The nave of the glen 
 Was filled with an army of little gray men 
 Not three feet in stature! They swarmed on the 
 
 crags, 
 
 Their tasseled caps waving like little red flags, 
 [129] 
 
Their buskined feet twinkling, their beards flowing 
 
 free, 
 Their eyes in a riot of mischievous glee 
 
 "And this wore a jerkin and that wore a 
 
 smock. 
 
 Some tended a blaze in a cup-shapen rock; 
 Some wheeled the black ore from the earth where 
 
 it bides 
 
 To smelt out the iron; yet others, besides, 
 Made ready wee anvils, or heated thick wedges 
 Of metal to whiteness. Then, down came the 
 
 sledges, 
 And up flew the sparkles! Oh, wonders they 
 
 wrought 
 
 In well-tempered iron, and swifter than thought. 
 And never a gnome of them boggled or shirked, 
 And ever the Little Men sang as they worked: 
 
 " Clang! cling! the hammers swing, 
 The flame-tongues leap, the anvils ring! 
 Commingling strength and craft and zeal 
 In welded bar and tempered steel 
 We frame our work with chanted spell 
 And cool it in the Wizard s Well. 
 
"Ho! ho! the bellows blow, 
 The coals awake, the forges glow! 
 Then let cold iron drink of fire 
 And weld the sledge that shall not tire, 
 The ax to lay the forest low, 
 The share to plow, the scythe to mow! 
 
 Hiss! hiss! the waters kiss 
 The finished tools, and naught s amiss. 
 Now stamp on each the elfin brand 
 That none shall ever fail the hand 
 In meadow, forest, forge, or mill, 
 That works with craft and might and will! 
 
 "A gnome with a frown and a gnome with a smile 
 (Like Warning and Blessing) advanced; from the 
 
 pile 
 
 A fire-new hammer, with handle complete, 
 They carried, and silently placed at my feet. 
 I gripped on the gift with a venturesome fist 
 And puff! all the pageantry passed like a mist! 
 
 "So, back from the wildwood, more earnest and 
 
 strong, 
 
 I bore to the smithy the hammer and song. 
 10 [131] 
 
And oft as I labor I think of the glen 
 And echo the chant of the Little Gray Men. 
 And still do I mark with their magical brand 
 Each scythe, ax, and plowshare that comes from 
 
 my hand 
 
 To bless with the succor of elf-given skill 
 The mortals who wield them with power and will." 
 
 [132 
 
A LILT IN FALL 
 
 The brown of her eyes in the oaken leaf. 
 The stir of her sighs in the mountain fir, 
 
 The scent of her breath in the garnered sheaf- 
 Oh, all the world shall sing of her! 
 
THE CHANGE OF FLAGS 
 
 TN August, 1664, while there was yet peace 
 * between Holland and Great Britain, Colonel 
 Nichols sailed up the Bay and demanded the sur 
 render of New Amsterdam. The demand was 
 backed by a show of four war-ships with a hundred 
 guns and a full complement of sailors, a body of 
 five hundred regular troops, and a considerable 
 force of New-Englanders, Long Island settlers, and 
 Indians. The fort was dilapidated, was commanded 
 by the hills to the northward, and Stuyvesant had 
 at his service but two hundred and fifty soldiers; 
 yet he obstinately refused to yield, replying in 
 simple faith to the English commander: 
 
 As touching the threats in your conclusion, we have 
 nothing to answer, only that we fear nothing but what 
 God (who is just as merciful) shall lay upon us, 
 all things being in His gracious disposal; and we may 
 as well be preserved by Him with small forces as by a 
 great army; which makes us wish you all happiness and 
 prosperity, and recommend you to His protection. 
 My lords, 
 
 Your thrice humble and affectionate servant and friend, 
 
 P. STUYVESANT. 
 
But resistance was too clearly hopeless. The 
 clamors of the people and the entreaties of his most 
 trusted counselors at last won from the governor 
 a reluctant consent to the articles of capitulation, 
 and the Dominie fairly dragged him from the 
 bastions of the fort, protesting, "I had much 
 rather be carried out dead!" 
 
 Yet some there were, headed by Borger Joris, 
 the sturdy blacksmith, who, refusing to accept 
 English rule, withdrew in disgust into the remote 
 interior; whence their stalwart descendants re 
 turned to do yeoman service against their tradi 
 tional foes in the Revolutionary War. 
 
 On the other hand, it is pleasant to remember 
 that the doughty governor spent the last years of 
 his long life in the city that he had ruled most 
 ably, if somewhat imperiously, mellowing with age 
 and loved and respected alike by Dutch and Eng 
 lish; and that his bones still rest in the vault of 
 old St. Mark s Church, within the soil of his cher 
 ished island. 
 
THE CHANGE OF FLAGS 
 
 A FLURRIED scud of sunlit sails 
 
 To make the sheltered port; 
 A flash of steel, a trumpet-peal 
 
 Within the seaward fort; 
 The grave-browed burgomasters 
 
 Have sought the council-hall; 
 Van Dyck has raised the yeomanry 
 
 To man the northern wall; 
 The Watch is up with ancient arms 
 
 That foiled the steel of Spain, 
 And groups of anxious burghers 
 
 Are clustered on The Plain. 
 
 And here is Abram Pietersen, 
 
 And hither from The Strand 
 Comes stalwart Borger Joris, 
 
 His hammer in his hand. 
 The vrouws have left their bread to burn, 
 
 The children leave their play 
 "The Englishmen! the Englishmen! 
 
 Their ships are in the Bay!" 
 
The stubborn Heer Direktor 
 
 Upon the rampart s height 
 Roused up his keen-eyed gunners, 
 
 Their linstocks blazing bright: 
 "Now make your weapons ready, 
 And hold your courage high! 
 (I ll hear the cannon s music 
 
 Once more before I die!) 
 And show these haughty English 
 
 That ye are of the strain 
 That held the walls of Leyden 
 
 Against the might of Spain!" 
 
 A hand upon his shoulder 
 
 And Peter turned in pride; 
 The Dominie, his comrade, 
 
 Was standing at his side. 
 "Old friend, and trusty soldier," 
 
 That man of God began, 
 "I know thy heart of courage 
 
 That fears not any man; 
 Yet save thy helpless city! 
 
 Provoke not ruthless war! 
 Alone, surrounded, friendless, 
 
 Outnumbered as we are. 
 [I37l 
 
Our sires held leagured Leyden 
 
 By spear and carronade; 
 But faithful Father William 
 
 Had sworn to bear them aid. 
 But spare a helpless people, 
 
 Beset on every hand, 
 Divorced by leagues of ocean 
 
 From home and fatherland !" 
 
 Then paused the stern Direktor, 
 
 While through a dimming mist 
 He viewed his little city 
 
 He clenched his iron fist 
 And smote the useless cannon. 
 
 "Thou speakest truth!" he said; 
 "I yield! but, God in heaven! 
 
 I would that I were dead!" 
 
 Then, shoulder touching shoulder, 
 
 With drum and trumpet-peal, 
 The princely flag of Orange 
 
 Above their caps of steel, 
 The city s stanch defenders 
 
 Marched shoreward, unashamed; 
 And, red against the heavens 
 
 The flag of England flamed. 
 [138] 
 
An angry man was Joris 
 
 Beside the blazing forge 
 To see above the rampart 
 
 The banner of St. George! 
 "So! must we swear allegiance 
 
 And bow our necks?" quoth he, 
 "And pay our tithes to puppets 
 
 Of kings beyond the sea? 
 What boot to fashion plowshares 
 
 And scythes, but hapless toil! 
 Oh, had I beaten broadswords 
 
 Ye might have held your soil! 
 
 "Ho! freemen! leave the city 
 
 For dukes to make or mar! 
 We ll raise our rugged hamlets 
 
 Among the hills afar; 
 And there I ll hammer sabers 
 
 For better men to use; 
 We ll breed a race of soldiers! 
 
 A race with hearts and thews! 
 Our children s children s children 
 
 Perchance may live to fling 
 Away these galling shackles 
 
 And scorn the tyrant king; 
 
 [139] 
 
And when they ve struck for freedom, 
 And when our debt is paid, 
 
 They ll think on Borger Joris 
 That wrought the battle-blade!" 
 
 140] 
 
Colonial 
 Period 
 
POLLY CORTELYOU 
 
 HTHE little English fleet that in August, 1664, 
 * sailed into the harbor with the forces under 
 Col. Richard Nichols, brought in its wake, besides 
 a change in government, the beginnings of many 
 other changes, social as well as political. There 
 was, it is true, a brief reversal to the old order 
 when a Dutch fleet retook the city from the in 
 vaders. But by a treaty that ended an indecisive 
 war, New Amsterdam became permanently New 
 York; old Dutch customs slowly yielded to livelier 
 English fashions; the English element grew pre 
 ponderant with the rapid increase of population, 
 and the little town became more and more a city. 
 But for many years New York presented a strange 
 contrast of nationalities and an often comical 
 blending of city and country scenes and manners. 
 The following little social incident occurred in the 
 early years of the new regime. 
 
 [143] 
 
POLLY CORTELYOU 
 
 PRETTY Polly Cortelyou, 
 Mistress of the dairy, 
 Born a dainty little shrew, 
 Sprightly and contrary, 
 
 "Sweet of manner, neat in 
 
 dress, 
 
 Buxom little charmer; 
 Who would have such love 
 liness 
 Wasted on a farmer!" 
 
 Built when only moor and wood 
 Edged the rustic byway, 
 
 Now her father s bouwerie stood 
 Fronting on the highway 
 
 Where, in sil-ken revelry, 
 
 Plumes and powdered tresses, 
 
 Passed Manhattan s chivalry, 
 Swept their hearts princesses. 
 
Rosy Polly Cortelyou 
 Kept the dasher turning, 
 
 Panting as the butter grew 
 Stiffer with her churning; 
 
 Frowning still on Harry Gray, 
 Merry spark of fashion, 
 
 Sipping buttermilk and whey 
 Just to cool his passion. 
 
 "Go!" said she, "thou face of brass; 
 
 Save thy coat of scarlet! 
 How should e er a farmer lass 
 
 Wed a lazy varlet!" 
 
 "Cruel Polly! leave the churn! 
 
 Think me not a rake, dear. 
 Sure," the gallant said, "I d turn 
 
 Shepherd for your sake, dear. 
 
 "Nay, you doubt me? Can you ask 
 
 Proof I love you madly? 
 Set me any servile task; 
 
 Faith, I ll do it gladly." 
 [ 145 1 
 
"Wilt thou then," the maiden spoke, 
 
 "Bear, till I enlarge thee, 
 Milking-pails and dairy yoke 
 
 Wheresoever I charge thee?" 
 
 "Sweet, Pd bear them," vowed the youth, 
 
 "Just to do thy pleasure, 
 Clear to Spain! and back, forsooth, 
 
 Heaping full of treasure." 
 
 Round his neck the dimpling miss 
 Bound the yoke, to tame him. 
 
 (If he tried to snatch a kiss, 
 Truly, do you blame him?) 
 
 Laughing at his helpless plight, 
 
 Led him from the dairy 
 (So a Jack-o -lantern sprite, 
 
 So an antic fairy, 
 
 Threading bog or muddy shore, 
 
 Draws a luckless mortal), 
 Through the house, toward the door, 
 
 Opened wide the portal. 
 
Then, that wicked little cheat, 
 Laughing still, to blind him, 
 
 Thrust him headlong to the street, 
 Snapped the lock behind him. 
 
 All Manhattan s brave array 
 Stopped and stared in wonder. 
 
 All Manhattan s gallants gay 
 Split their sides asunder. 
 
 There he stood in silken coat, 
 
 Rapier silver-hiked, 
 Snowy scarf about his throat, 
 
 Beaver bravely tilted, 
 
 Harry Gray, the ballroom s pride, 
 Yoke across his shoulders, 
 
 Brimming pails on either side, 
 Joy of all beholders. 
 
 Heartless Polly shrieked with mirth, 
 Screened behind the casement. 
 
 Open! open! kindly earth! 
 Cover his abasement! 
 
 11 [147] 
 
Each of twenty youths, they say, 
 
 Solemn as a major, 
 Took his oath that Harry Gray 
 
 Did it on a wager. 
 
 Eight-and-forty ladies fair 
 
 (Can a man deceive them?) 
 Dropped their eyes and heard them swear 
 
 Didn t quite believe them. 
 
 Gallants, heed! Twere well ye should, 
 
 Be they ne er so loving, 
 Chain your hearts; to field and wood 
 
 Send them not a-roving. 
 
 Woman-craft in subtle toys 
 
 All your wit surpasses. 
 Let the canny country boys 
 
 Woo the farmer lasses! 
 
CITY HALL PARK 
 
 Erg Cabot s prow was westward turned, 
 
 Before old Hudson came, 
 Upon this island acre burned 
 
 The Red Man s council flame. 
 
 Then here the settler s cattle grazed 
 
 Along the bowered track; 
 And here his bell-mouthed musket blazed 
 
 And drove the savage back. 
 
 But yonder rose the gallows-tree 
 
 Where, calm and fearless-eyed, 
 Our first sad pledge to Liberty, 
 
 Great-hearted Leisler died. 
 
 And hither flocked from shops and farms, 
 When Freedom s summons flew, 
 
 Those large-boned, sun-browned men-at-arms 
 That wore the buff and blue. 
 
 [149] 
 
Oh, build your walls, for build you will, 
 
 On earth less dearly known; 
 Leave this one spot unburdened still 
 
 With tyrant steel and stone! 
 
 A scroll whereon brave youth shall trace 
 Brave deeds of days gone by, 
 
 A shrine, a little, hallowed space 
 Unroofed beneath the sky. 
 
 [150 
 
THE STORM SHIP 
 
 TN early English colonial times, especially in Col. 
 * Benjamin Fletcher s administration from 1692 
 to 1698, the city of New York was a veritable 
 paradise of pirates, who carried thither for sale 
 the spoil of the Indian seas and swaggered boldly 
 in the streets, having, it is pretty well established, 
 purchased protection, if not from the governor 
 himself, at least from his trusted advisers. Nat 
 urally the outfitting of buccaneering vessels and 
 the marketing of the treasure that they brought 
 into port were wonderfully good for business, 
 wherefore great was the righteous indignation of 
 the honorable merchants of the city when Fletch 
 er s successor, the inflexible Earl of Bellomont, 
 presumed to interfere with the profitable traffic 
 and strove to bring the pirates to justice. 
 
 Everybody has heard of Capt. William Kidd, 
 once a respectable householder of Liberty Street; 
 how, in 1696, empowered with King William s 
 commission, he sailed in the Adventure galley to 
 
prey upon the pirates of the Indian Ocean; how 
 he turned pirate himself, and how punishment 
 overtook him. It is known that before Kidd sur 
 rendered himself to justice he sailed up Long Island 
 Sound as far as Oyster Bay and left part of his 
 booty at Gardiner s Island, whence it was recovered 
 by the government; but all wise men of the sea 
 agree that the fate of his piratical vessel or vessels 
 and the hidi ng-places of his fabulous treasures 
 remain dark and delightful mysteries. 
 
 Vague stories of the terrible captain still echo 
 among the Highlands of the Hudson, where Cald- 
 well s Landing bears the alternative name of 
 "Kidd s Point," and where "Kidd s Plug Cliff" 
 is still shown as a repository of his golden hoard; 
 moreover, there is a well-attested tradition that 
 the charred hulk of his hapless ship still lies be 
 neath the waters of the river at the foot of Dunder- 
 berg. 
 
 152] 
 
THE STORM SHIP 
 
 HER sails are wove of the fogs that flee; 
 
 Her masts are wraiths of the Baltic firs; 
 The phosphor-glow of a sultry sea 
 
 Is the only foam that her forefoot stirs. 
 
 Her lanterns gleam with the wan corpse-light, 
 The clouds roll black where her helmsman steers; 
 
 The silent shapes on her main-deck s height 
 Are of Hudson old and his mutineers. 
 
 She comes from the capes of Labrador; 
 
 Through the death-white fleet of the North she 
 
 glides, 
 And the fisher-craft of the mist-hung shore 
 
 Keep close in port when the Storm Ship rides. 
 
 [153] 
 
Full-crammed with Eastern silk and gold 
 
 A guilty treasure, won amid 
 Red wrack and slaughter homeward rolled 
 
 The pirate craft of Captain Kidd. 
 
 And, "Westward, ho!" the chorus rang; 
 
 "Our hatches brim with precious store. 
 Let beggars fight and cowards hang! 
 
 But we shall live like lords, ashore." 
 
 "A sail to windward; ho! a sail!" 
 The lookout from the foretop cried. 
 
 The captain heard that boding hail; 
 He gripped the cutlass at his side. 
 
 "She comes in chase no flag displayed; 
 
 Belike a war-ship of the Crown 
 Run out the starboard carronade 
 
 And send her mainmast toppling down!" 
 
 The gunner aimed and well he could; 
 
 The linstock blazed, the chain-shot flew; 
 It brought no crash of rending wood, 
 
 Yet cut the mainmast through and through. 
 
 [154] 
 
It cut the mast before their eyes, 
 
 Yet mast and spars stood stiff and strong; 
 And underneath the darkening skies 
 
 That drumly vessel bowled along, 
 
 No murmur in her bellied clouds 
 Of canvas, gray without a fleck; 
 
 The breeze was voiceless in her shrouds, 
 The crew stood silent on her deck; 
 
 And, like a red-hot cannon-ball, 
 
 The sullen sun in skies of lead 
 Revealed, beneath a murky pall, 
 
 The livid faces of the dead! 
 
 Round spun the wheel! In panic, blind 
 To all but that dread shape abeam, 
 
 They fled, a rising gale behind, 
 
 Up Hudson s glamour-haunted stream. 
 
 Proud Mannahatta s island key 
 Was left astern. The sun went down. 
 
 They swept the shores of Tappan Zee 
 Beneath the heights of Tarrytown. 
 
They drove across the sea-broad sweep 
 That laps the hills of Haverstraw 
 
 To Dunderberg s enchanted steep 
 Whose goblins keep the vale in awe. 
 
 Around the frowning mountain boiled 
 That swirling ebb, the Devil s Race; 
 
 In vain the tide-held pirate toiled! 
 While onward drove the wraith in chase. 
 
New horror froze the cutthroat band; 
 
 For, as the phantom closer came, 
 Her ghostly captain waved his hand 
 
 And Dunderberg was ringed with flame! 
 
 Red levin smote the buccaneer; 
 
 Her kindled rigging lit the night; 
 And helter-skelter, mad with fear, 
 
 The pirates plunged in headlong flight. 
 
 The crackling flame-tongues searched the hold; 
 
 A rending crash, a wild turmoil 
 Of smoke and foam and Hudson rolled 
 
 Above a wealth of blood-won spoil. 
 
 And he that scaped the flame and wave 
 Was spared to sound the depths of shame; 
 
 For him a dungeon s living grave, 
 A felon s death, a blackened name. 
 
 Her sails are wove of the fogs that flee; 
 
 Her masts are wraiths of the Baltic firs; 
 The phosphor-glow of a sultry sea 
 
 Is the only foam that her forefoot stirs. 
 
 [157] 
 
When she lays her head to the whooping gale 
 And the corpse-light flares on her lofty sides, 
 
 Oh, it s run for port with a thrice-reefed sail! 
 For the waves wax rich where the Storm Ship 
 rides. 
 
OFF FIRE ISLAND 
 
 With snapping flag against the gray, 
 With plunging bows awash with spray, 
 Our little sloop is running free 
 Before the Dawn awakes the sea. 
 
 The west wind strains the bellied sail; 
 The foams above the low lee-rail; 
 The hand-line stings; in frenzied strife 
 The flashing bluefish leaps for life! 
 
 [159] 
 
THE THANK-OFFERING 
 
 T TNDER the rule of the English governors, im- 
 ^-^ migration was encouraged and new farming 
 communities gathered along the quiet reaches of 
 the Hudson. The farms flourished and the 
 farmers prospered; and sometimes, becoming too 
 proud in their prosperity, they were properly 
 rebuked by such wandering men of God as 
 Overbeck, the Forest Preacher, from the region of 
 the Tappan Zee. 
 
 160] 
 
THE THANK-OFFERING 
 
 OVERBECK, the Forest Preacher, 
 
 Bent his silvered head: 
 "Harvest yields for every creature 
 
 Food in store," he said. 
 
 "Ye that know your Lord is living, 
 
 Witnessing His grace, 
 Heap your tithes of all His giving 
 
 Round His altar-place." 
 
 Ere November breezes blowing 
 
 Bared the silver birch, 
 Harvest-plenty overflowing 
 
 Filled the little church. 
 
 [161] 
 
Farmer-folk in pleasant parley 
 Praised the crops they d reared 
 
 Dirck Van Brunt his sheaves of barley 
 Yellow as his beard, 
 
 Peter Smit his orchard s bounty; 
 
 Boastful Gert Von Horn 
 Swore no croft in all the county 
 
 Equaled his for corn. 
 
 Housewives showed in oaken caskets 
 
 Butter firm and good. 
 Children brought in birchen baskets 
 
 Nuts of copse and wood. 
 
 All was set before the altar, 
 
 When across the moor 
 Crept the widow, Gretel Baiter, 
 
 Wrinkled, bent, and poor. 
 
 "She! that earns with all her labors 
 
 Scant enough to live, 
 Helped and clothed by kindly neighbors 
 
 What hath she to give?" 
 [162] 
 
12 
 
 "Come, behold the widow s treasure !" 
 
 All the world drew near. 
 Just a little earthen measure 
 
 Filled with water clear. 
 
 Just an earthen cruse, upon it 
 
 Writ in letters plain 
 Yea*, and all her world might con it 
 
 "God be thanked for rain." 
 
 Overbeck, the Forest Preacher, 
 
 Raised his noble head: 
 "She, not I, shall be your teacher, 
 
 Oh, my friends," he said. 
 
 "What are treasures proudly tendered? 
 
 Dross before His throne! 
 Humble offerings, humbly rendered, 
 
 Loveth God, alone." 
 
 163] 
 
SAXON HARVEST HEALTH 
 
 Here s to the plow that furrowed, 
 Here s to the hand that sowed, 
 
 Here s to the rake that harrowed, 
 Here s to the arm that mowed! 
 
 Blest with the choice of blessings 
 Are orchard and hill and plain 
 
 The blessing of Grapes and Apples, 
 The blessing of Sheaves of Grain. 
 
TUBBY HOOK 
 
 ABOUT two-thirds of a mile below Spuyten 
 Duyvil, at the old settlement of Inwood from 
 where the Fort Lee ferry carries picnic-parties 
 across the Hudson to the Palisades, there is a 
 rock-edged cape which, before filling-in operations 
 changed its rounded outline, by its appearance 
 alone justified its old Dutch name of "Tobbe 
 Hoeck" the Cape of the Tub now rendered 
 "Tubby Hook." 
 
 After much inquiry I finally learned from the 
 bearded lips of an old settler the true explanation 
 of this promising name. And as the memory of 
 the narrator extends back to the time "when Canal 
 Street was way down to the Battery/ 7 his authority 
 on legendary matters is plainly indisputable. 
 
 165] 
 
TUBBY HOOK 
 
 MEVROUW VON WEBER was brisk though fat; 
 She loved her neighbor, she loved her cat, 
 She loved her husband; but, here s the rub 
 Beyond all conscience she loved her tub! 
 She rubbed and scrubbed with strange delight, 
 She scrubbed and rubbed from morn till night; 
 
 Her earthly hope 
 
 Was placed in soap; 
 
 Her walls and chimneypiece fairly shone, 
 Her skirts were starched so they stood alone! 
 Fl661 
 
By mop and duster and broom she swore. 
 
 She scrubbed the floor 
 
 Until she wore 
 
 The oak in channels from door to door. 
 The flood she reveled in never ebbed, 
 
 And hill to dale 
 
 Retold the tale 
 That both her hands and her feet were webbed! 
 
 Now Hans, her husband, was mild and meek; 
 He let her scrub through the livelong week; 
 But when the sud of her washtub churned 
 On Easter Sunday! the earthworm turned. 
 
 "Nay, vrouw," quoth he, 
 
 "Let labor be! 
 
 This day when all of the world s at feast 
 Thou lt wash no more in my house, at least! * 
 She stopped her toil at her lord s command. 
 
 Without a sound 
 
 She flaunted round 
 
 And took her tub to the river strand, 
 Where Hans, who followed in dark dismay, 
 
 Could hear her vow, 
 
 His angry vrouw, 
 
 "I ll wash and wash till the Judgment Day!" 
 [167] 
 
Along a river that leaped in flame 
 The Sailing Witches of Salem came. 
 (They ride the waters, that evil crew, 
 Wherever the Duyvil hath work to do.) 
 And every witch in a washtub sat, 
 And every witch had a coal-black cat 
 That steered the course with a supple tail, 
 
 A shift for sail, 
 
 A shell to bale, 
 
 A thread to reef when the wind blew strong, 
 A broom to whurry the bark along. 
 
 They hailed the vrouw on her spit of sand; 
 She waved them back with a soapy hand. 
 Cried one whose face was a Chinese mask, 
 "This dame is sworn to a goodly task! 
 [168] 
 
Come, friends that ride on the crested swell, 
 We ll charm the spot with a lasting spell 
 
 That here she ll stay 
 
 And scour away, 
 
 And never rest till the Judgment Day!" 
 With cries to Satan and Beelzebub 
 They shaped the cape like an upturned tub! 
 Beneath its dome and the shifting sands 
 That busy vrouw at her washtub stands, 
 
 While day and night 
 
 She bends her might 
 To scrub the fur of a black cat white! 
 
 When down the river the norther scuds 
 The waves are flecked with the rising suds. 
 When clouds roll black as a Dutchman s hat 
 You ll hear the wail of the injured cat! 
 
 So heed her fall, 
 
 Good housewives all, 
 
 And take this truth from a ragged song 
 That super-cleanliness may go wrong! 
 
THE HOUSE OF BLAZES 
 
 (A Modern Legend of Spuyten Duyvif) 
 
 Where Spuyten DuyviFs waves environ 
 Manhattan s stern and rock-bound shore 
 
 With fume and flame of molten iron 
 A foundry 9 s chimneys blaze and roar. 
 
 Upon a northward promontory 
 
 The "House of Blazes" stands in pride 
 A tavern famed in local story, 
 
 Where grimy furnace-men abide. 
 
 Now, one of these, in proud elation. 
 Despatched a letter oer the foam. 
 
 And bitter grief and consternation 
 
 That missive caused in Patrick s home! 
 
 "Och! Mother av the Saints in glory!" 
 
 The wail arose as Nora read: 
 "Sure, Pathrick s gone to purgathory! 
 
 He niver wrote that he was dead! 
 
" Me job is ahl I culd desire, 
 
 Sez he, though somewhat warrm I feel 
 Wid heapin coal to feed the fire 
 
 An 1 makin pies av red-hot steel. 
 
 " The boss is jist the kind that plates. 
 And ahl me mates is mighty civil. 
 
 I m dwellin* in the House av Blazes, 
 And right forninst the Spittin DivW" 
 
ZENGER THE PRINTER 
 
 TN 1735, under the Administration of Gov. Will- 
 iam Cosby, John Peter Zenger, publisher of 
 The New York Weekly Journal, was prosecuted 
 for libel mainly because of a bitter satirical review 
 of Cosby s corrupt government that had appeared 
 in his paper. The proceedings were conducted 
 with the greatest unfairness. Zenger s attorneys 
 were expelled from the bar. But on the day of the 
 trial Andrew Hamilton, an old and eminent law 
 yer from Philadelphia, undertook the defense. 
 "Shall not the oppressed have even the right to 
 complain?" he demanded. "Shall the press be 
 
silenced that evil governors may have their 
 way?" 
 
 Although the chief justice charged the jury to 
 convict on the ground that an attack on a gov 
 erning official was libelous whether the statements 
 made therein were true or false, the jury boldly 
 disregarded the charge and declared the defendant 
 "Not guilty" amid the cheers of the audience. 
 
 This was the first successful assertion of the 
 liberty of the press at a time when in the cities of 
 Europe and America thought and speech were 
 severely restricted. 
 
ZENGER THE PRINTER 
 
 ZENGER the Printer, through storm and stress, 
 Deaf to a sycophant Council s rage, 
 
 Doggedly toiled at his wooden press 
 Building his monument, page by page, 
 
 Telling of tyranny s foul disgrace, 
 Rousing the spirit that never dies, 
 
 Shouting for right in the market-place, 
 Speaking the truth in a world of lies! 
 
 Vexing the governor s pampered fold, 
 Scourging with irony s stinging whip, 
 
 Showing how justice was bought and sold; 
 Phrasing the wrath of the curling lip. 
 
 Wrongfully haled through the public street, 
 Wrathfully flung on the dungeon floor, 
 
 Grimly he published that galling sheet 
 
 Out "through the hole in the prison door." 
 
 [1/4] 
 
Vain were the wiles of a servile judge 
 Twisting to evil the wholesome laws! . 
 
 Vain was the governor s heavy grudge! 
 Gallant old Hamilton pled his cause: 
 
 "Men of Manhattan! your fateful word 
 Curses or blesses the coming time! 
 
 Say! shall the downtrodden die unheard? 
 What of your freedom if Truth be crime! 
 
 Nobly the men of a free-born strain 
 Answered the note of that noble plea, 
 
 Cleaving the truth-teller s futile chain 
 Freeing the weapon that made them free! 
 
 Zenger the Printer his work is done; 
 
 Soft be his slumber. Through storm and stress 
 Guard we the prize of the fight he won 
 
 Bulwark of Freedom, a fearless press! 
 
 175] 
 
THE RIVER 
 
 What may the gray gull know 
 
 Ere the rolling sun is high 
 Of the wakened world below 
 
 His road in the winnowed sky? 
 
 The song of the crowded streets. 
 The throng of the wharf and quay, 
 
 The tryst of ships where the river meets 
 The burst of the gladdened sea. 
 
 Where the smoke-ivreaths lift and melt. 
 Where the mainsail flaps and fills, 
 
 And Hudson heaves like a wampum belt 
 On the breast of the strong, red hills. 
 
 What may the nighthawk view 
 
 As the great wings cleave their way 
 
 Through the gemmed arc s deeper blue 
 To the haunt of his midnight prey? 
 
The fairy lamps that show 
 
 On masthead, shrouds, and spars; 
 The million lights of the town that glow 
 Like a bank of welded stars; 
 
 And the flare of red abaft, 
 
 And the flash of the green abeam, 
 
 And the glow-worm glare of the dragon craft 
 That glide on the sable stream. 
 
 [177] 
 
BUTTERMILK CHANNEL 
 
 "DUTTERMILK CHANNEL" is the name 
 *~* still attached to the strait between Red 
 Hook on the Brooklyn shore and Governor s 
 Island. Some hold that the passage was so called 
 because of the buttermilk which, with other prod 
 uce, the country wives were wont to bring across 
 it in fleets of market-boats on their way to New 
 York. Other legends, however, indicate that the 
 name was sometimes sportively applied to the 
 
broader passage of the East River, and there is a 
 tale to the effect that it commemorates the re 
 sourcefulness of the adventurous daughter of a 
 Long Island farmer when overtaken by a sudden 
 storm that raised a great commotion in the nar 
 row channel. 
 13 
 
 [179] 
 
BUTTERMILK CHANNEL 
 
 "PRAY tarry, Nancy Blossom, 
 
 With your freight of corn-in-silk 
 And your chickens and your cheeses 
 
 And your cans of buttermilk! 
 Wait the morning with your gossip 
 
 In her cabin on the strand; 
 Bid that lazy darky Mingo 
 
 Draw the market-boat to land; 
 For the river channel s brawling, 
 
 And the windy heavens frown, 
 And you ll never reach Manhattan 
 
 Fore the sun goes down!" 
 
 But Nancy had her errand 
 
 And the market wouldn t wait, 
 So she oared the heavy wherry 
 
 Through the currents of the strait. 
 Then the tempest broke above her! 
 
 And the chickens squawked in fright; 
 And the little darky Mingo 
 
 Fairly turned from black to white 
 [180! 
 
As he chattered, "Laws-a-massy! 
 
 Wuz dis nigger bawn to drown? 
 Oh, we ll nebber reach Manhattan 
 
 Fore de sun goes down!" 
 
 Then she cuffed that little darky 
 
 Till she taught him to behave; 
 And they poured a can of buttermilk 
 
 Upon the saucy wave; 
 And the roughness of the channel 
 
 Grew as smooth as watered silk, 
 As the angry tide was tempered 
 
 By the mildness of the milk. 
 So they made the land in safety 
 
 Mid the cheers of half the town 
 In the harbor of Manhattan 
 
 Fore the sun went down. 
 
 When the bleak nor easter blusters, 
 
 When the summer tempests roar 
 And their host of prankish goblins 
 
 Bend the masts along the shore, 
 When the wind-lashed wave is scurried 
 
 Down the river to the Bay, 
 How the surges of the channel 
 
 Froth and foam with milk and whey, 
 [181] 
 
All to honor Nancy Blossom 
 Who achieved this high renown 
 
 When she crossed to old Manhattan 
 Tore the sun went down! 
 
 182 
 
A CITY GARDEN 
 
 Sun-warmed, where Hudson meets the sea, 
 My motley-blossomed croft is sown 
 
 A desert inn that cheers the bee 
 Astray amid our wastes of stone 
 
 Where pansies raise their velvet heads y 
 Where lilies nod to hollyhocks 
 
 Across the sweet-alyssum beds; 
 And tiger-bells and four-o clocks, 
 
 Right neighborly, together grow 
 
 The wild and tame, the red and white; 
 
 And here I spend the hour of glow 
 
 Ere moths and bats bring in the night. 
 
 And here my chair s a ducal throne; 
 
 I rule a fief in Fairyland, 
 Though scarce to any serf is known 
 
 My puissant, scepter-wielding hand. 
 
Unchecked, his subterrene abode 
 
 That Earth-gnome Worm may dig with zeal, 
 Nor shall I balk the Ogre Toad 
 
 Who marks him for a horrid meal! 
 
 Those gay Zingaras of the breeze, 
 
 The air-delighting Butterflies, 
 Have come to woo my trellised peas 
 
 That mock so well their forms and dyes. 
 
 I know yon dart of emerald light 
 
 That shakes the arbor s dewy shower! 
 
 The Humming-bird, bold errant knight, 
 Is tilting with the trumpet-flower! 
 
 Unthanked, unknown, aloof, benign, 
 By wayward whim alone controlled, 
 
 Like him that ruled in ease divine 
 The careless, lawless Age of Gold, 
 
 So do I hold Saturnian reign 
 
 Till one transcending day, I ween, 
 
 Shall welcome to her leal domain 
 My Suzeraine the Faery Queen. 
 
 184 
 
BOWLING GREEN 
 
 r ]PHE little half-acre park on lower Broadway 
 * just north of the Custom-House has preserved 
 its identity through many vicissitudes. First an 
 Indian camping-site and council-place, then part of 
 a parade-ground, next a bowling-green, and finally, 
 though under widely varied auspices, a park for 
 the privileged few or the general public, it has 
 been intimately connected with many of the most 
 significant events of the city s history. 
 
 Known in the earliest days as the "plain before 
 the fort" and even then largely devoted to recrea 
 tion, it was in the year of Washington s birth 
 leased for the consideration of "one peppercorn per 
 annum" to three gentlemen "in order to make a 
 Bowling Green there." It was thus the first officially 
 authorized park in the city. In 1772 it is described 
 in the diary of John Adams as "A beautiful ellipsis 
 of land, railed in with solid iron, in the center 
 of which is a statue of his majesty on horseback, 
 yery large, of solid lead gilded with gold, standing 
 
on a pedestal of marble, very high." It was this 
 leaden statue that a few years later was pulled 
 down by his Majesty s rebellious subjects and run 
 into bullets dedicated to the discomfiture of his 
 Majesty s troops. The railing that still surrounds 
 the green is said to be the original fence mentioned 
 by Adams; but tradition has it that the iron up 
 rights were formerly surmounted with decorative 
 crowns which were broken off by the mob that de 
 throned the leaden statue of his Majesty King 
 George III. 
 
 186] 
 
BOWLING GREEN 
 
 A PLEASANT breadth of open space 
 In wastes of stone, a breathing-place 
 For dusty toil, though ages roll 
 Unchanged it spreads a verdant scroll 
 Whereon is writ, for knowing eyes, 
 The legend of a city s rise. 
 Rule prince or people, king or queen, 
 Still Bowling Green is Bowling Green. 
 
 For here, before the Dutchman came, 
 The Red Man lit his council-flame 
 To plan the hunt or ambuscade; 
 And here his dark-eyed children played. 
 Where now De Peyster s image stands 
 The simple sachems gave their lands 
 For trinkets easy victims fit 
 For such as crafty Minuit. 
 
 Next rose Kryn Frederyck s bastioned fort. 
 Before the northward sally-port 
 The soldiers drilled a gallant breed 
 Of men that held the Yankee, Swede, 
 [187] 
 
And Weckquaesgeek in high disdain. 
 Upon this level, then "The Plaine," 
 Van Twiller broached the foaming keg, 
 Stout Peter stumped on timber leg. 
 
 Here drovers sold the flock s increase; 
 The sullen savage sued for peace; 
 The young folk came, with dances gay 
 And garlands, bringing in the May, 
 While elders nodded, sage and bland, 
 And lovers rambled hand in hand 
 Till English guns in churlish rage 
 Knelled out our city s Golden Age. 
 
 Then, richly turfed and weeded clean, 
 The gentry laid the level green, 
 Alluring sport-delighting souls 
 To cast the jack and hurl the bowls. 
 And here, as loyal hearts decreed, 
 King George bestrode a leaden steed, 
 Till hot rebellion spurned the Crown 
 And horse and king went crashing down. 
 
 Thrice welcome, Peace! The British drum 
 Hath beat retreat; and see! they come! 
 [188] 
 
With heads erect and muskets true 
 The tattered troops in buff and blue 
 The men that crossed the Delaware 
 And trapped the Hessian in his lair 
 The men of York, of Monmouth plain, 
 Who marched with Greene, who charged with 
 Wayne, 
 
 Who fought the war of seven years, 
 Who whipped the Redcoat Grenadiers 
 With swinging stride come marching in, 
 And all the air is wild with din; 
 While, strong of limb and stout of soul, 
 Van Arsdale climbs the well-greased pole 
 And wrenches down the crimson rag 
 And sets on high the starry flag! 
 
 This bit of turf that woos the sun 
 The stately step of Washington 
 Hath pressed; and Fulton knew it well; 
 And Irving loved its hallowed spell. 
 It knows the visions, strifes, and tears 
 And joys of thrice a hundred years. 
 Unchanged amid a changing scene, 
 The city s heart is Bowling Green. 
 [189] 
 
Periods 
 
MARY MURRAY OF MURRAY HILL 
 
 "DELMONT" was the name given by Lindley 
 *~* Murray to his mansion that stood on the 
 height called by the Dutch "the Incleberg," but 
 now known as "Murray Hill," in the neighborhood 
 of what is now Park Avenue and Thirty-seventh 
 Street. 
 
 The Murray estate lay in the direct line of march 
 of the British forces under Sir William Howe, 
 when, on September 15, 1776, having effected a 
 landing at Kip s Bay on the East River about 
 Thirty-fourth Street, they advanced across the 
 island and northward in the wake of the re 
 treating Americans. A picturesque tradition tells 
 that the strategic hospitality of Mary Murray, 
 delaying the British general, enabled Putnam and 
 Aaron Burr to withdraw Silliman s brigade and 
 Knox s artillery from a perilous position in the 
 city to the southward. 
 
 193 
 
MARY MURRAY OF MURRAY HILL 
 
 THE Lady of Belmont looked out to the east: 
 The smoke of the battle was wafted aside; 
 
 The shattering roar of the cannon had ceased; 
 The British flotilla swept over the tide. 
 
 And on came the gallant battalions in red 
 With glimmer of steel and victorious cheers; 
 
 The hills of Manhattan re-echoed their tread 
 The conquering march of the King s Grenadiers. 
 
 The Lady of Belmont looked south to the sea; 
 
 Manhattan s green valleys were spread to her 
 
 ken; 
 "And whose may that column of riflemen be 
 
 Now plain on the hillside, now hid in the glen ?" 
 
 "Tis Putnam s! Gray Putnam, to dangers anew 
 He carries the scars of the Indian fights! 
 
 But where may the doughty old hero win through 
 To Washington s army encamped on the 
 Heights? 
 
 [194] 
 
"For, barring his path, moves the army of Howe 
 Then Howe must be halted whatever the cost! 
 
 No valor can save the old general now; 
 Tis Howe must be halted, or Putnam is lost!" 
 
 The Lady of Belmont came down from her tower 
 As Howe at her gateway his battle-steed reined. 
 
 "Now rest thee, Sir William," she cried, "for an 
 
 hour! 
 Thy warfare is over, the laurel is gained. 
 
 "And since thou hast conquered my friends with 
 the sword, 
 
 The meed of a victor must fall to thy share; 
 Then sit, if thou wilt, at a true rebel s board 
 
 And taste, if thou wilt, of our good rebel fare." 
 
 Then light laughed Sir William and leaped to the 
 ground 
 
 (And still, at his word, stood the glittering ranks) ; 
 He bowed to the lady in homage profound, 
 
 In phrases right courtly he spake her true thanks. 
 
 And long had he tarried her bounty to taste, 
 For rich was her larder and merry was she, 
 
 When up rode an orderly spurring in haste: 
 "111 tidings, ill tidings, Sir William!" cried he. 
 [197] 
 
"For Putnam hath slipped through the gap in our 
 line! 
 
 He snapped at our vanguard, the crafty old fox, 
 And, flaunting his flag with its evergreen pine, 
 
 Is off to the rebels encamped on the rocks!" 
 
 Oh, wroth was Sir William, but sweetly he smiled, 
 And murmured, full knightly, "Fair Lady, I 
 fear 
 
 The fox stole away as the hounds were beguiled. 
 Kind hostess, thy bounty hath cost us too dear!" 
 
 198] 
 
UNCLE SAM TO JOHN BULL 
 
 John Bullikins, my jo, John, 
 
 We ve known each other long. 
 I ve sometimes thought you right, John, 
 
 And often thought you wrong. 
 We ve had our little tiffs, John; 
 
 Yet, whether friend or foe, 
 I ve nursed a high regard for you, 
 
 John Bullikins, my jo. 
 
 John Bullikins, my jo, John, 
 
 When all is said and done, 
 A letter friend than you, John, 
 
 Is not beneath the sun. 
 Youve planted noble realms, John, 
 
 Where men may freely grow; 
 I wouldn t lose you for the world, 
 
 John Bullikins, my jo. 
 
 John Bullikins, my jo, John, 
 What bunglers we have been! 
 
 For I m a bungler, too, John, 
 Which makes us closer kin. 
 J. 199 ] 
 
We ll somehow blunder through y John; 
 
 Then humbly we will go 
 To school together, hand in hand t 
 
 John Bullikins, my jo. 
 
 I 200] 
 
HAARLEM HEIGHTS 
 
 HISTORIANS of the Revolution have generally 
 underestimated the importance of the Battle 
 of Haarlem Heights, the lively encounter between 
 detachments of the King s troops and Washing 
 ton s forces, September 16, 1776, upon the hills 
 extending south from West One Hundred and 
 Thirtieth Street, now sometimes called the "Acrop 
 olis of New York." 
 
 While this skirmish was in the main an affair 
 of outposts, it was the first fight in which the 
 
 [ 201 ] 
 
Americans defeated their opponents in the open 
 field, and the victory, though barren of direct 
 results, was an inspiration to the disheartened 
 soldiers and was hailed by them as an earnest of 
 ultimate success. 
 
 [202] 
 
HAARLEM HEIGHTS 
 
 Captain Stephen Brown of Knowlton s Connecticut 
 Rangers tells of the affair of September 1 6, 1776. 
 
 THEY VE turned! they ve fought! Good-by, King 
 George, 
 
 Despite your hireling band! 
 Our prentice lads have borne a brunt; 
 
 Our farmer boys will stand! 
 
 Though Peace may lag and Fortune flag, 
 
 The fight s as good as won; 
 We ve made them yield in open field! 
 
 We ve seen the Redcoats run! 
 
 Our Rangers sallied forth at dawn 
 
 With Knowlton at their head 
 To rout the British pickets out 
 
 And change a pound o lead. 
 
 [203] 
 
We gave them eight brisk rounds apiece 
 
 And, fighting, hurried back 
 For, eighteenscore, the Light-armed Corps 
 
 Were hot upon our track. 
 
 Along the vale of Bloomingdale 
 
 They pressed our scant array; 
 They swarmed the crag and jeered our flag 
 
 Across the Hollow Way. 
 
 Their flankers hooted, "Hark, away!" 
 
 Their buglers, from the wall, 
 In boastful vaunt and bitter taunt 
 
 Brayed forth the hunting-call. 
 
 Oh, sound of shame! It woke a flame 
 
 In every sunburnt face; 
 And every soul was hot as coal 
 
 To cleanse the foul disgrace; 
 
 Ay, some that blenched on Brooklyn Heights 
 
 And fled at Turtle Bay 
 Fair wept for wrath, and thronged my path 
 
 And clamored for the fray. 
 
 [204] 
 
Our general came spurring! 
 
 (There rolled a signal drum); 
 His eye was bright, he reared his height, 
 
 He knew the time had come. 
 
 He gave the word to Knowlton 
 
 That led our own command, 
 The pick of green Connecticut 
 
 And Leitch with Weedon s band 
 
 Of tall Virginia riflemen, 
 
 Free hunters of the deer, 
 To round the braggart Briton s flank 
 
 And take him in the rear. 
 
 We left the dell, we scaled the fell, 
 
 And up the crest we sprang, 
 When, crackling sharp along the scarp, 
 
 A deadly volley rang, 
 
 And down went Leitch of Weedon s band 
 Deep hurt, but dauntless still; 
 
 And down went Knowlton, sword in hand- 
 The sword of Bunker Hill. 
 
 [205] 
 
I raised his head. But this he said, 
 
 Death-wounded as he lay. 
 "Lead on the fight! My hurt is light 
 
 If Freedom win the day!" 
 
 In open rank we struck their flank, 
 And oh! the fight was hot! 
 
 Up came the Hessian Yagers, 
 Up came the kilted Scot, 
 
 Up came the men of Linsingen, 
 
 Von Donop s Grenadiers! 
 But swift we sped the whistling lead 
 
 About the Dutchmen s ears. 
 
 They buckled front to Varnum s brunt, 
 We crumpled up their right, 
 
 And, driving back the crimson wrack, 
 We swept along the height. 
 
 The helmet of the Hessian 
 
 Is tumbled in the wheat! 
 The tartan of the Highlander 
 
 Shall be his winding-sheet! 
 [1061 
 
In mingled rout we drove them out 
 From orchard, field, and glen; 
 
 In goodly case it seemed to chase 
 Our "hunters" home again! 
 
 We flaunted in their faces 
 
 The flag they thought to scorn, 
 
 And left them with a wild "Hurrah!" 
 To choke their hunting-horn! 
 
 Upon a ledge embattled 
 
 Above the river strand 
 We dug the grave for Knowlton 
 
 And Leitch of Weedon s band; 
 
 And though our star through stress of war 
 
 Desert this island throne, 
 Upon that ledge remains the pledge 
 
 That we will claim our own! 
 
 [207] 
 
THE BLOCK-HOUSE IN THE PARK 
 
 The North Wind storms my rugged front, 
 The ivy scales my southern wall; 
 
 I never knew the crashing brunt 
 Of musketry or cannon-ball. 
 
 When armies met in battle-shock, 
 When smoke of navies rolled afar. 
 
 Men made me strong on living rock; 
 I frowned with guns awaiting war; 
 
 Awaiting war that never came, 
 
 A virgin fortress still I stand; 
 But now, unscathed by hostile flame, 
 
 I guard a gate of Fairyland. 
 
 For, while my gloomy watch I stood. 
 Unmarked the leafy marvel grew; 
 
 Behind me spread the mystic wood 
 A place of dreams where dreams are true; 
 [208! 
 
Where low winds move the tasseled fir, 
 
 Where lilacs breathe, where brown bees hum. 
 
 Where old men tell of days that were, 
 Where lovers talk of days to come; 
 
 Where boyish cohorts, undismayed. 
 Deploy beneath the friendly trees 
 
 To take my cliffs by escalade. 
 May all their wars be such as these! 
 
 [209] 
 
THE STORMING OF STONY POINT 
 
 TIKE many another good soldier, before and 
 -*- since, Gen. Anthony Wayne strongly objected 
 to a nickname imputing to him the characteristic of 
 rash, headlong courage. As a matter of fact, his 
 popular title, "Mad Anthony/ is said to have been 
 fastened upon him by a grumbling Irish soldier 
 whom he had severely disciplined. It is certain 
 that Wayne was a strategist as well as a dashing 
 fighter. His most brilliant exploit, the storming 
 of Stony Point, was carefully planned and perfectly 
 executed; and Wayne s calm courage is shown by 
 the fact that he led the storming party in person 
 in spite of a strong, though happily false, premo 
 nition that he would be killed in the attack. 
 
 [210] 
 
THE STORMING OF STONY POINT 
 
 HIGHLANDS of Hudson! ye saw them pass, 
 Night on the stars of their battle-flag, 
 
 Threading the maze of the dark morass 
 Under the frown of the Thunder Crag; 
 
 Flower and pride of the Light-armed Corps, 
 Trim in their trappings of Buff and Blue, 
 
 Silent, they skirted the rugged shore, 
 Grim in the promise of work to do. 
 
 "Cross ye the ford to the moated rock! 
 
 Let not a whisper your march betray! 
 Out with the flint from the musket-lock! 
 
 Now! let the bayonet find the way!" 
 
 "Halt!" rang the sentinel s challenge clear. 
 
 Swift came the shot of the waking foe. 
 Bright flashed the ax of the pioneer 
 
 Smashing the abatis, blow on blow. 
 
 15 [211] 
 
Little they tarried for British might! 
 
 Little they recked of the Tory jeers! 
 Laughing, they swarmed to the crested height, 
 
 Steel to the steel of the Grenadiers! 
 
 Storm King and Dunderberg! wake once more, 
 Sentinel giants of Freedom s throne, 
 
 Massive and proud! to the eastern shore 
 
 Bellow the watchword: "The fort s our own!" 
 
 Echo the cannon s triumphant peal! 
 
 Shout for the hero who led his band, 
 Swept on a billow of burnished steel 
 
 Over the parapet, "spear in hand!" 
 
 [212] 
 
If 
 
 5- * 
 
 II 
 
 r 
 
 * 
 
OLD TRINITY 
 
 This was a merchant, and that was a belle. 
 There lies a statesman you know how he fell. 
 
 Under that monument fronting the street 
 Rests the young sailor, who, spurning defeat, 
 
 In a lost battle, and with his last prayer 
 Gave us a watchword to challenge Despair. 
 
 Tory and Patriot camp side by side; 
 Truce of the turf to their rancor and pride! 
 
 Look toward the river. The stone at your feet 
 Shelters a blade of his Majesty } s fleet, 
 
 Gallant and gay, when the red-coated leaven 
 Troubled our city, in seventy-seven. 
 
 What of his ending? (the daisies may know 
 More that is silence) a word and a blow! 
 
Then, a locked room in the tavern, the gloom 
 Flickered with candles; the whisper of doom; 
 
 Bicker and ring of encountering steel. 
 Panting of bosoms, the stamp of the heel, 
 
 Feint, circle, parry, lunge, counter, and carte! 
 Dead! like a man, with a thrust through the heart! 
 
 What was the cause? Ah, you question in vain! 
 Dorothy, Annabel, Phyllis, or Jane, 
 
 Queen of assemblies and toast of the bold, 
 Somewhere she slumbers in Trinity s mold. 
 
 Search in your heart if you seek to descry 
 That which is hidden! the passions that lie 
 
 Buried in Earth with her grasses above 
 Sorrow and Ecstasy, Hatred and Love. 
 
 [216] 
 
THE FATE OF THE HESSIAN 
 
 T 1 7 HERE the City Prison now frowns upon 
 * * Center Street a beautiful pond once allured 
 the angler and swimmer in summer and the skater 
 in winter. This little lake was called by the Dutch 
 "Kalch Hoeck," because of the vast quantity of 
 shells that lined its shores, and later, by the Eng 
 lish, the Fresh Water or Collect Pond. Originally 
 it was a place of pure delight; but, perhaps because 
 of sinister incidents such as the hanging of some of 
 the alleged participants in the Negro Plot on the 
 island in its center, ill-omened rumors spread to 
 darken the fair fame of the little inland sea. It was 
 whispered that the pond was bottomless and that 
 uncanny monsters lurked in its dark depths, ready 
 to seize the unwary bather a story that was 
 countenanced by several fatalities. 
 
 Early in the last century a smoke-breathing 
 monster did indeed swim upon the surface of the 
 lake, for it was here that Robert Fulton launched 
 the model of his first steamboat. Abuse and neg- 
 
lect finally changed the once bright sheet of water 
 into a foul and evil-odored pool, and about 1810 
 the Collect Pond was drained and filled in and dis 
 appeared from the city map, to be recalled only 
 in a few traditions such as that which follows. 
 
THE FATE OF THE HESSIAN 
 A LEGEND OF THE COLLECT POND 
 
 WHO blusters along with his clattering blade, 
 In green regimentals and brass-fronted helm, 
 
 With blackened mustaches, and hair in pomade 
 And powder as proud as a Prussian? the 
 schelm ! 
 
 Who ruffles with bullies and frightens the fops? 
 
 Who growls at the tavern, gruff- voiced as a bear: 
 
 "Sturmwetter un Hagel! Schnell! Hier mit mein 
 
 schnapps?" 
 
 Why, Friedrich von Heusen, the Hessian chas 
 seur; 
 
 The scorn of the Briton who gives him his pay; 
 
 The tyrant and dread of the Tory recruits, 
 The bugbear of children, who shrink from the way 
 
 And quake at the creak of his heavy-soled boots, 
 
For foul are the rumors that darken the door 
 Of Sugar-House Prison that Keep of Despair, 
 
 Where poor, captive rebels are dead by the score 
 In Friedrich the Jailer s benevolent care! 
 
 The Hessian caroused at the inn till the gray 
 Stole over the rose where the sun had gone down, 
 
 Then strolled through the fields to the Collect 
 
 that lay 
 Embosomed in meads, to the north of the town 
 
 A lake that was loved by the angler, who claimed 
 The crimson-flecked trout of its crystalline waves, 
 
 But shunned after twilight, for monsters unnamed 
 Arose from the depths of its bottomless caves. 
 
 As Friedrich glanced out toward its centering isle 
 He spied in the thicket, half hidden from view, 
 
 A form, worn and wasted and lean as a file, 
 In rags of rebellion the BufF and the Blue. 
 
 " Ho, kerl !" jeered the jailer, "thy garments are torn ! 
 
 Thou runaway rebel, come hither, I say! 
 Thy comrades are lonely, thy prison s forlorn. 
 
 No? Dummkopf! Til fetch thee; and then shalt 
 thou pay!" 
 
 [220] 
 
He cast down his helmet in ireful haste, 
 
 He kicked off his jack-boots, he tore off his coat, 
 
 And, girding the big-hiked sword to his waist, 
 He splashed in the lake with a curse in his throat. 
 
 The waters, as black as the glass of Lorraine, 
 Were stirred from their depths with a heave and 
 
 a roll; 
 Fright-stricken, the Hessian surged forward in 
 
 vain! 
 The Fiend of the Collect had come for his toll! 
 
 He struggled, but silent, resistless as Fate 
 
 A huge scaly arm strained his thews, fold on 
 fold, 
 
 He screamed in his madness; remorseless as Hate 
 A great, evil claw gripped his throat in its hold. 
 
 The bubbles rose, sobbing, then ceased and were 
 
 still; 
 
 The ripple was hushed on the shell-littered shore; 
 The darkness descended on river and hill; 
 
 And field, camp, and prison knew Fried rich no 
 more! 
 
 221] 
 
THE INN: AN OLD EPITAPH 
 
 Post-haste we ride the road of men 
 From shadow through to shade again, 
 But rein, to breathe or tighten girth, 
 At that old inn yclept " The Earth" 
 There some delay to dine and sup. 
 While some but taste a stirrup-cup; 
 And some have ease and ample fare, 
 And some find little comfort there. 
 His score is large who bides a day; 
 Who soonest goes hath least to pay. 
 
 [222] 
 
THE DYCKMAN HOUSE 
 
 1VTORTH of the line of Dyckman Street to 
 ^ ^ Spuyten Duyvil Kill stretched the domain 
 ruled by the dynasties of Jan Dyckman and Jan 
 Nagel, and ruled in neighborly amity save for the 
 comparatively brief duration of a feud arising 
 from a violation of manorial ethics the Nagel 
 goose strayed into the Dyckman corn and was bit 
 ten by the Dyckman dog. For a time the feeling 
 aroused by this episode was so bitter that the trans 
 action of public business was hampered by the re 
 fusal of the heads of the two houses to sit on the 
 same administrative board. But the breach was 
 soon healed. In fact, a year after the death of 
 Nagel, in 1689, Jan Dyckman married the widow 
 of his late feudal brother, and the second genera 
 tion of both clans was reared under the same roof. 
 Yet the Dyckmans appear to have been the stronger 
 breed, and "Dyckman" still remains a name to 
 conjure by in northern Manhattan. The original 
 Dyckman homestead was burned during the Revo- 
 
 [223] 
 
lution; but the farm-house built by William Dyck- 
 man and his sons in 1783 on their return from the 
 war and exile still stands on the west side of Broad 
 way at Two Hundred and Fourth Street, restored 
 and converted into a public memorial of the past 
 through the generosity of the inheritors of the 
 Dyckman blood and spirit. 
 
 [2241 
 
THE DYCKMAN HOUSE 
 
 PLAIN as the brass of an old sword-hilt 
 
 Is the tale of the house that the Dyckmans built. 
 
 In Charles the Second s jovial reign, 
 Jan, the first of the Dyckman strain, 
 Fair-haired, ruddy, strong, and shrewd, 
 Cleared the soil, and his hardy brood 
 Killed the wolves in their rocky lairs, 
 Turned the loam with iron shares. 
 
 Full a hundred years had fled; 
 Well the Dyckman race had sped; 
 Sweet their orchards, broad their farms 
 When Freedom called true men to arms. 
 They nursed no doubts of the need of force; 
 They did their part as a thing of course. 
 Forth they sallied, boy and man. 
 William, head of the Dyckman clan, 
 Took the field, and his three good sons 
 Marched along with their flintlock guns 
 
Abraham bold and Michael keen 
 
 And blithe young William, aged thirteen. 
 
 Through the war with its changing tides 
 The Dyckmans fought in the gallant Guides. 
 Their chronicles may still be found 
 In the blood-stained roll of the Neutral Ground, 
 And yellowed, time-worn records tell 
 How sturdy Abraham Dyckman fell, 
 Raiding the camp of De Lancey s corps, 
 And how young William paid that score. 
 
 Peace at last! In full retreat 
 Sounded the tramp of alien feet 
 Quitting the isle we love; and then 
 The Dyckmans came to their own again. 
 But the camping foe had left their land 
 Bare as the back of a baby s hand. 
 Waste were the fields and the orchards, too; 
 Burned was the home in which they grew. 
 
 The Dyckman breed were men of force; 
 They took their task as a thing of course. 
 Again they plowed their wasted leas, 
 Again they set their orchard trees; 
 
 [226] 
 
With toughened timbers, marked by fire, 
 
 From tumbled barn and ruined byre, 
 
 They raised the framework, strongly planned, 
 
 Of this old house. Long may it stand 
 
 A monument for coming years 
 
 Of the last of the flower of the pioneers. 
 
 For in this brave old house survives 
 The lesson blazed by its builders lives: 
 
 "Be true; and keep, whatever befall, 
 The faith that each man owes to all. 
 Be strong; for strength shall purge you clear 
 Of all mean hatreds born of Fear. 
 Then, should the years that hither press 
 Bring other days of storm and stress, 
 A race of clean-limbed, clear-eyed men 
 Shall look the world in the face again." 
 16 
 
 [227] 
 
OUR COLONEL 
 
 Deep loving, well knowing 
 His world and its blindness, 
 
 A heart overflowing 
 
 With measureless kindness, 
 
 Undaunted in labor 
 
 (And Death was a trifle). 
 Steel-true as a saber, 
 
 Direct as a rifle, 
 
 All Man in his doing, 
 All Boy in his laughter, 
 
 He fronted, unruing, 
 
 The Now and Hereafter, 
 
 A storm-battling cedar, 
 A comrade, a brother 
 
 Oh, such was our leader, 
 Beloved as no other! 
 [228] 
 
When weaker souls faltered 
 
 His courage remade us, 
 Whose tongue never paltered, 
 
 Who never betrayed us. 
 
 His hand on your shoulder 
 
 All honors exceeding. 
 What breast but was bolder 
 
 Because he was leading! 
 
 And still in our trouble, 
 In peace or in war-time, 
 
 His word shall redouble 
 Our strength as aforetime. 
 
 When wrongs cry for righting 
 No odds shall appal us; 
 
 To clean, honest fighting 
 Again he will call us, 
 
 And, cowboys or doughboys, 
 We ll follow his drum, boys, 
 
 Who never said, "Go, boys!" 
 But always said, "Come, boys!" 
 
 [229] 
 
A RAID OF THE NEUTRAL GROUND 
 
 TT^vURING the greater part of the Revolutionary 
 -^ War the British lines were at King s Bridge, 
 at the upper end of Manhattan Island, the Amer 
 ican outposts about thirty miles to the north. The 
 No Man s Land in between, the lovely hill-and- 
 valley region of Westchester, was known as "the 
 Neutral Ground," presumably because there was 
 more mixed fighting to the square mile in that 
 locality than anywhere else in the thirteen states. 
 The rallying-place of the American partizans was 
 a stone building known as Young s house, not far 
 from White Plains, which commanded the road 
 eading down the Valley of the Nepperhan. 
 Young s house was burned by the enemy; and 
 the following ballad tells the tale of a retaliatory 
 attack by the Westchester Guides and other Revo 
 lutionary forces, upon De Lancey s Royal Refuge 
 Corps encamped under the guns of Fort Number 
 Eight on the heights overlooking the Harlem River. 
 As the old campaigner who tells the story of the 
 
 [230] 
 
raid is, like all of the Revolutionary party, so bitter 
 against the Tories, it is well to remember that these 
 American loyalists were, to a large extent, men of 
 high principle, honestly devoted to their cause, and 
 that the infant Republic lost much of its best blood 
 by their wholesale migration to Canada at the 
 close of the war. 
 
 231] 
 
A RAID OF THE NEUTRAL GROUND 
 
 "Up! bully boys of the Nepperhan! 
 
 Gather! ye troopers, grim and rough; 
 Ye of the hardy homespun clan, 
 
 Ye who have trained in the Blue and Buff. 
 Come from the Highlands, grandly free, 
 
 Barring the stream to the baffled foe; 
 Come from your farms by the Tappan Zee, 
 
 Come from the Vale of Pocantico!" 
 Dark of the moon; and shadows deep 
 
 Curtain the road on field and ridge; 
 Laggardly watch the redcoats keep, 
 
 Calling the word at Dyckman s Bridge. 
 
 Down in a dell by the Sawmill ford 
 
 Fourscore men to the muster throng; 
 Scarred are some by the British sword, 
 
 Scarred are some by the deeper wrong: 
 Murdoch he of the Monmouth fray; 
 
 Dircksen, wreck of a massive bulk, 
 One of the hundreds racked away, 
 
 Starved in the Jersey s prison hulk; 
 
 [232] 
 
Dyckman, breathing his dead boy s name; 
 
 Young, God knoweth, a vengeful man, 
 Brooding and dark since the Tory flame 
 
 Blackened his home by the Nepperhan. 
 Oh, give and take is the way of war, 
 
 And of cloven helmets our own swords tell; 
 But the turncoat curs of the Tory corps 
 
 We hate as we hate the gates of hell. 
 
 Only the beaver, sunk from view, 
 
 Watched us pass with a furtive eye; 
 Only the owl of Mosholu 
 
 Challenged us as we skirted by; 
 Only the stars, through a drift of gray 
 
 Silently beckoning, led us straight 
 There where De Lancey s Tories lay 
 
 Under the guns of Number Eight. 
 
 "Brands!" And the bridge upon Haarlem s breast 
 
 Melts in a broken chain of fire; 
 Every hut has a flaming crest, 
 
 Every shack is a blazing pyre. 
 Blundering out to the lurid night 
 
 Rally the shreds of the hated corps; 
 Speak to them! gun of the Trenton fight, 
 
 Bell-muzzled piece of the Indian War! 
 
 [235] 
 
Reavers and harriers, each and all, 
 Traitors with blood of their country wet 
 
 Ply them with rifle and musket-ball! 
 At them with saber and bayonet! 
 
 Loosen the horses! Burn the hay! 
 
 Kill whom ye must and take whom ye can, 
 For the Yagers are up on the King s Bridge Way. 
 
 So it s back! through the Valley of Nepperhan! 
 Three miles up through the well-known glade, 
 
 Helmeted Yagers hard on our track, 
 Laughing, we turned at our ambuscade, 
 
 Hurling the Hessians staggering back. 
 
 [236] 
 
Dark were our deeds of the steel and brand? 
 
 Aye. But they weaned a stubborn foe, 
 Held him at bay, while our leader planned, 
 
 Cautious and wise, for the final blow. 
 Judge us fairly, if judge ye may; 
 
 Freed is our country of hostile ban; 
 Redcoat and Hessian have had their day; 
 
 Peace rules the Vale of the Nepperhan. 
 
 [237] 
 
WASHINGTON IN WALL STREET 
 
 Sublime, where traffic s billows beat 
 A nation s wealth about his feet. 
 He stands; upon the surging street 
 
 He looks benignly down. 
 He hears the distant, wall-hid sea, 
 The silver chime of Trinity, 
 And, voicing passion, grief, or glee. 
 Our million-throated town. 
 
 And, up and down, our tasks we ply 
 With rapid step and heedless eye, 
 Alert alone to sell and buy; 
 
 But when the day grows dim, 
 When evening brings its sweet release 
 From toil and care, when tumults cease, 
 When twilight crowns his brow with peace, 
 
 The children come to him. 
 
 Rejoicing, free, in careless grace 
 They climb the massy granite base; 
 
 [238] 
 
Unazved, they view that noble face, 
 They swarm the brawn knees 
 
 Whose polished surface now denies 
 
 The gray of age that artists prize; 
 
 But more than art is all that lies 
 In love of such as these. 
 
 What matters race, or hue, or creed? 
 Though born to wealth or born to needy 
 Or sprung of poor plebeian seed 
 
 Or proud patrician stem, 
 From lowly hut or lordly hall 
 By these his land shall rise or fall. 
 His hand outstretched above them all, 
 
 Their father blesses them. 
 
 [239] 
 
FORT TRYON 
 
 CORT TRYON, at One Hundred and Ninety- 
 * sixth Street and Fort Washington Avenue, 
 overlooking the Hudson, was the key to the north 
 ern defenses of Fort Washington; and its capture 
 by the Hessians under Rahl and Knyphausen, 
 after a desperate defense, November 16, 1776, gave 
 Manhattan Island to the enemy for the remainder 
 of the war. 
 
 240 
 
FORT TRYON 
 
 AGAIN there s a golden haze 
 
 On the shadow of Hudson glades; 
 Again are the leaves ablaze 
 
 On the breast of the Palisades; 
 Again from the loft of the wind-swept stair 
 
 We watch how the sea-gulls fly, 
 And we drink full draughts of the sparkling air 
 
 From the deep blue cup of sky. 
 
 Look south where the ocean rills, 
 
 Look east to the dancing Sound, 
 Look north to the swelling hills 
 
 And the vales of the Neutral Ground ! 
 From the Mart of the Sea where the millions toil 
 
 To the heights in the farthest ken 
 There is never a rood of the sacred soil 
 
 But was bought with the blood of men. 
 
 The red that the woodland shows, 
 
 The swell of the city s hum, 
 Seem the garb of advancing foes 
 
 And the roll of a phantom drum; 
 
The glimmer that leaps to the parapet 
 As we look toward the Northern Town 
 
 Is the shimmer of helmet and bayonet 
 As the Hessian troops come down. 
 
 Once more swing the hostile boats 
 
 In the eddies of Haarlem Kill, 
 While the Cross of the Briton floats 
 
 On the ramparts of Laurel Hill; 
 And the grass-mantled battlements wake again 
 
 To the whir of the musket-ball 
 And the shouts of the Maryland Riflemen 
 
 As they close with the hosts of Rahll 
 
 What need that defeat be cloaked? 
 
 They lost; but was theirs the blame 
 Who fought till their rifles choked 
 
 With the reek of the darted flame? 
 And the meed of their deaths, of their woes and 
 scars 
 
 Is a boon such alone could buy; 
 See! the stainless Flag of the Clustered Stars 
 
 Rides alone in a peaceful sky! 
 
 242 
 
DECATUR S TOAST 
 
 "Our Country! In her intercourse with foreign nations 
 may she always be right; but, Our Country Right or 
 Wrong!" COMMODORE STEPHEN DECATUR, Norfolk, 
 Virginia, April, 1816. 
 
 Up rose, triumphant, from his seat 
 
 The Bayard of the Sea 
 The lion of our laureled fleet, 
 
 The scourge of Barbary; 
 His glass abrim with bubbling light, 
 
 He pledged that brilliant throng 
 " Our Country! be she ever right; 
 
 Our Country! right or wrong!" 
 
 Then round about the oaken board 
 
 The goblets leaped and rang, 
 And fervent fingers pressed the sword 
 
 As up the heroes sprang; 
 No mawkish qualms or doubts had they 
 
 That echoed deep and strong, 
 "Our Country! ever right, we pray; 
 
 Our Country right or wrong! 
 17 [ 2 43 ] 
 
Too well the stifling mists they knew 
 
 That dimmed the Stars we bore 
 The plots of banded traitors, who, 
 
 Amid the stress of war, 
 Made weightier their nation s woes, 
 
 Till rose the patriot song: 
 " When face to face with foreign foes, 
 
 Our Country! right or wrong!" 
 
 Stanch lovers of our free domain, 
 
 We strive for truth and right 
 With honest force of heart and brain 
 
 As God may give us light. 
 But doubts must yield and ties must break 
 
 When darkening perils throng; 
 And when the sullen guns awake, 
 
 "Our Country! right or wrong!" 
 
 244] 
 
THE BALLAD OF JOHN PAUL JONES 
 
 1VJO more picturesque figure ever adorned a 
 ^ ^ quarter-deck than Commodore John Paul 
 Jones, whom some English writers even in recent 
 days have insisted on miscalling a "Scotch pirate." 
 
 Jones s daring cruise in British waters in 1777-78 
 spread a terror along the coasts utterly out of 
 proportion to the insignificance of his force a 
 terror still evidenced by queer old songs of the 
 day and grotesque caricatures representing the 
 rather dapper commodore as a most ruffianly 
 pirate. His chief exploit was the capture of the 
 Serapis off Flamborough Head, September 23, 
 1779, after the most desperate fight between single 
 vessels on record. 
 
 Although some recent biographers have claimed 
 for Jones more than history warrants, there is no 
 doubt that he was a dauntless fighter, an able 
 strategist, an admirable seaman, something of a 
 diplomat, and withal a man most punctilious in 
 honor. 
 
THE BALLAD OF JOHN PAUL JONES 
 
 "For Capt. Paul Jones ever loved close fighting." 
 BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 
 
 HE hath masted the flag of the crimson bars 
 
 To dance in a gladdened sky. 
 He hath claimed a salute for the Thirteen Stars, 
 
 And the cannon of France reply. 
 
 He hath harried the barks of the Narrow Seas, 
 He hath trodden the Scottish ling, 
 
 He hath flaunted his rebel blazonries 
 In the face of the stubborn king. 
 
 From the Frith of Forth through the startled North 
 
 The panic rumor runs, 
 
 And the coastguards south into Humber Mouth 
 Know the blare of the Yankee guns. 
 
 He had cruised that coast for a week, I wis, 
 
 And mickle the woe and loss, 
 When he was aware of the Serapis 
 
 That floated St. George s Cross. 
 
 [246] 
 
And her sailors laughed: "Ho! merchant craft, 
 
 What cargo have ye got?" 
 "Have back your jape! We carry grape 
 
 And round and double shot!" 
 
 Then the thundering broadsides flashed and roared 
 
 And the musketry sped its rain; 
 But the second round that the Richard poured 
 
 Her great guns burst amain. 
 
 There was slaughter and wreck to her quarter 
 deck, 
 
 And the foemen knew her plight; 
 "Have you struck?" they sang. His answer rang: 
 
 "I have not begun to fight!" 
 
 He veered around till his counter ground 
 
 On the bows of the British craft; 
 He grappled her fast to his mizzenmast, 
 
 He grappled her fore and aft. 
 
 Their yards were locked as the horns of stags 
 
 That war on the trampled steep. 
 They strove in night as the dragons fight 
 
 In the darks of the churning deep. 
 
 [247] 
 
And gun kissed gun with the kiss of hate 
 
 And the ban of the blazing lip; 
 And the gunners leant till the rammers went 
 
 Through the ports of the hostile ship. 
 
 And shot rent through and splinters flew; 
 
 It was fire and flood and wrack, 
 Red flame ashine on hissing brine 
 
 And red blood curdling black. 
 
 But ever the Richard s topmen swept 
 The decks of the shrinking foe; 
 
 They won their way with the musket-play 
 \Vhile the Briton raged below. 
 
 [248] 
 
The sailors clung to the dizzy shrouds 
 
 And spars that bent and swayed; 
 Through the open keeps to the powder-heaps 
 
 They hurled the loud grenade. 
 
 A roar went up from the Serapis, 
 
 A roar and a cry of bale, 
 The smoke-cloud rolled from her shattered hold 
 
 And she leaped like a wounded whale. 
 
 A shout went up from the Richard s crew 
 As they swarmed o er the side to strike, 
 
 And the moonlight played on the cutlass blade 
 And the flame on the boarding-pike. 
 
 A sullen hail from her quarter-deck, 
 
 A cheer from the Yankee tars; 
 St. George s Cross must own its loss, 
 
 To the steel of the Thirteen Stars. 
 
 He hath taken his prize to the Texel Roads 
 Where none should work him wrong, 
 
 But the British wrath is about his path, 
 And the British arm is strong. 
 [249] 
 
And the Land of the Fen is scant of men; 
 
 Though her people speak him fair, 
 He must bend his mast ere a week be past, 
 
 For he may not harbor there. 
 
 "We know not your stripes and your dancing stars, 
 
 So choose ye, stout John Paul: 
 Will ye leave your prize where moored she lies, 
 
 Or away neath the flag of Gaul?" 
 
 "Tis by evil chance that I leave to France 
 What we bought with the blood so red, 
 
 But away we ll slip in a weaker ship 
 With the free stars tossed o erhead." 
 
 It was black as the maw of a witch s cat 
 And the wind was a shrieking gale. 
 
 Twas a murk, murk night, and the waves threshed 
 
 white 
 Neath the strokes of the norther s flail. 
 
 "Oh, it s reef your sail to the sweeping gale 
 And the threat of the wintry skies, 
 
 For we re up and away from the churlish bay 
 Neath the bonniest flag that flies!" 
 
 [250] 
 
There are twoscore ships of the Channel Fleet 
 
 All alert for the rover dread; 
 And the king hath told a wealth in gold 
 
 As the price of the "pirate s" head. 
 
 But the fleet may rest from a bootless quest 
 And the king tell his guineas o er; 
 
 He is running free on the open sea 
 And home to the western shore. 
 
 Though he struck for the right and in open fight 
 
 And he kept his honor clear, 
 They affront his fame with their lying blame 
 
 And the taunt of "the Buccaneer"! 
 
 So we ll drink, "Paul Jones!" and the world may 
 hark 
 
 While the clashing beakers peal! 
 For he took his prize in a sinking bark 
 
 By the sweep of the moonlit steel! 
 
 251] 
 
THE OLD "CONSTITUTION" 
 
 Before the wind that greets the sun 
 
 She bowled along in glee 
 The brave old ship whose cannon won 
 
 The freedom of the sea. 
 
 And fifteen stripes and fifteen stars 
 
 She flaunted high in air 
 When Huffs fierce broadsides raked the spars 
 
 Of England s "Guerriere" 
 
 The school where heroes proved their worth 
 
 In gale or battle smoke, 
 Her masts were pines of mountain birth, 
 
 Her sides were native oak. 
 
 And proud in sails without a fleck, 
 
 She rode to meet the foe 
 When Bainbridge walked her quarter-deck 
 
 A hundred years ago. 
 
 [252] 
 
FRAUNCES TAVERN 
 
 AT the corner of Broad and Pearl Streets stands 
 ** Fraunces* Tavern, now restored, as nearly 
 as might be, to its condition in the days when 
 Gen. George Washington made it his head 
 quarters. The old mansion was erected early in 
 the eighteenth century by Stephen or fitienne De 
 Lancey, and later was purchased by Samuel 
 Fraunces, who opened it as an inn displaying the 
 sign of "Queen Charlotte." 
 
 Many historic gatherings have been held within 
 the walls of the old house, but its chief title to 
 fame is the fact that its Long Room witnessed the 
 affecting parting of Washington and his generals 
 at the close of the Revolution. 
 
FRAUNCES TAVERN 
 
 RESTORE, O Thought, whose potent weird 
 Recalls the Past on lagging pinion, 
 
 The corbeled roof De Lancey reared 
 
 What time Queen Anne maintained dominion. 
 
 Away with dust and rattling pave! 
 
 Let all be swarded, green and trim, 
 And call the river s banished wave 
 
 Again to lap a garden s rim. 
 
 How bright with silk and rich brocade, 
 With baldric broad and tossing feather. 
 
 The Long Room rilled when youth and maid 
 Went swinging down the floor together! 
 
 Those heavy beams could make avow 
 Of all the joys of dance and reel, 
 
 Of flirt of fan and courtly bow 
 And sudden glint of jealous steel. 
 
 [254] 
 
But ruthless Traffic claimed the place; 
 
 And swarthy-visaged Landlord Fraunces 
 Displayed Queen Charlotte s pictured face 
 
 To awe his guests with regal glances. 
 
 Then here the traveler reined his beast 
 And drank his noggin in the shade, 
 
 And merchants met in solemn feast 
 To ponder for the weal of trade; 
 
 And captains, fresh from siege and plain, 
 Rehearsed their tales of savage warring 
 
 At Frontenac and Fort Duquesne 
 
 In tones that set the glasses jarring, 
 
 And pledged the memory of him 
 
 Who stormed the Heights of Abraham 1 
 
 In bumpers beaded to the brim 
 With rousing punch of Rip van Dam. 
 
 Oppressed by laws of grievous weight 
 And tyrant craft but ill dissembled, 
 
 Within these walls, in high debate, 
 The "Sons of Liberty" assembled. 
 
 [255] 
 
In vain they pled for right undone! 
 
 In vain, for hearts were stern and proud 
 Till rang the shot of Lexington 
 
 And grimly closed the battle-cloud. 
 
 
 
 But hark! the room resounds anew 
 
 With clink of spurs and clank of sabers; 
 The leader comes to bid adieu 
 
 To those who shared his wars and labors 
 
 To knightly Schuyler, void of stain, 
 To rugged Morgan, frank and free, 
 
 To faithful Knox and fiery Wayne, 
 And dashing Light-Horse Harry Lee. 
 
 [256] 
 
To all he pledged the cup of grace; 
 
 From every eye the tear-drop started; 
 Each clasped his chief in strong embrace; 
 
 In silent grief the heroes parted. 
 
 Oh, cherish safe from force unkind, 
 
 Though rust consume both sword and pen, 
 
 Those ancient walls that hold enshrined 
 The honest love of gallant men! 
 
 257 
 
THE PALISADES 
 
 HPHE Mahican or Mohegan Indians, a principal 
 * tribe of the great Lenni-Lenape or "Original 
 People," had their own version of the origin of 
 their noble river, the Mahican-ittuck, which we 
 call the Hudson, and a version that is partly justi 
 fied by the observations of geologists. The legend 
 of the river is also connected with another of the 
 creation of the Palisades, those great columns and 
 ramparts of basaltic rock that rise on the western 
 shore of the sacred stream. 
 
 261 
 
THE PALISADES 
 
 HEAR an ancient Indian legend told in many a 
 
 lodge of yore 
 Where the great Mahican-ittuck rolls on Manna- 
 
 hatta s shore; 
 
 Where across the silent river frown in furrowed 
 lights and shades 
 
 Fire-born basalt, brave with verdure, forest- 
 crowned, the Palisades. 
 
 "Know ye why our corn is golden ere the forest 
 
 breaks in flame? 
 Why our rivers leap with salmon? Why our 
 
 woodland stirs with game? 
 
 "Children of the Ancient People! over all your 
 
 home is blest; 
 For of all the lands beneath him, yours the 
 
 Manitou loved best. 
 
 [262] 
 
"High among old hills that knew not council- 
 flare nor hunter s trail 
 
 Slept a lake, unrilled though forests crashed be 
 fore the northern gale; 
 
 "For, upon a central island raised, the mystic 
 
 wigwam stood 
 Where the Mighty Spirit brooded, planning for 
 
 his people s good. 
 
 "Envious, the Sons of Evil vexed the lake with 
 
 frightful dreams 
 Till the billows, white with terror, stormed the 
 
 isle in torrent streams, 
 
 "Forced the gateway of the hills, and headlong 
 
 to the vale below 
 Plunged in panic, dashing, tumbling formed the 
 
 river that ye know. 
 
 "Rose in wrath the Mighty Spirit; caught and 
 
 bound the evil band; 
 Spake unto the waves and calmed them; led the 
 
 river with his hand. 
 
 [263] 
 
"Where the turbid waters mingled with the brine 
 
 of ocean waves, 
 There the Master flung his captives howling down 
 
 the dismal caves. 
 
 "Over them his potent magic reared the massive 
 
 cliffs that stand 
 Jailers of the Sons of Evil, wardens of the favored 
 
 land. 
 
 "Through the bitter Moon of Snowshoes, by your 
 lodge-flames crouching warm, 
 
 Ye may hear the captives wailing to their broth 
 ers of the storm; 
 
 "But they may not force their prison; nor may 
 
 spirit evil-crazed 
 Ever pass the charmed ramparts by the hand of 
 
 God upraised. 
 
 "Hail! ye shaggy-breasted Giants, rugged guards 
 of field and glade! 
 
 Tempest-quelling, stand forever; matchless, change 
 less, unafraid!" 
 
 [264] 
 
UNDER THE PALISADES 
 
 Light as a leaf on the lifting swell, 
 
 Balanced by touch of the spruce-wood blades. 
 Poised like a javelin, floats my shell 
 
 Under the frown of the Palisades. 
 
 Molded were they in volcanic fire, 
 Up from the bosom of Chaos hurled, 
 
 Battlement, pinnacle, column, spire 
 
 Carved by the Chisel that wrought the world. 
 
 Clear to their Dunsinane rampart sweep 
 Bough-bearing armies of rooted foes; 
 
 Bright in their chasms the cascades leap; 
 Over their rubble the fox-grape grows. 
 
 Long have they guarded the river s flow, 
 Summer and winter the ages through, 
 
 Watching the argosies come and go 
 Go, like the Indian s frail canoe. 
 
 [265] 
 
Proud in the heavens they seem to say, 
 Catching my feathering oarblade s gleam, 
 
 "What is yon waif of a passing day 
 Vexing the rill of our golden stream?" 
 
 Cliffs of the eons that woo the sky, 
 
 Furrowed with shadows of world-old thought, 
 
 Brood ye in pity on such as I? . . . 
 I shall be deathless when ye are naught! 
 
 [266] 
 
THE DEVIL S STEPPING-STONES 
 
 TT may have been a too intimate acquaintance 
 * with the grimmer side of Old World theology 
 that led the early settlers to give over to the 
 powers of evil the fairest lands and waters in their 
 new possessions. "Hell Gate" and "Spuyten 
 Duyvil" mark the eastern and northern limits of 
 Manhattan. Up the Hudson, on the west shore 
 not far beyond Poughkeepsie, is the "Duyvils* 
 Dans-kammer," the Devils Dancing-chamber. 
 Even placid Long Island Sound figures on old 
 Colonial maps as "the Devil s Belt"; and the 
 irregular, broken reefs that stretch from the base 
 of Great Neck across the Sound to the mainland 
 are to this day known as "the Devil s Stepping- 
 
 267 
 
THE DEVIL S STEPPING-STONES 
 
 A SKY of gold, a sea of blue, 
 
 A drowsy day of naught to do; 
 
 In pleasant waves our lines we threw 
 
 At anchor as we lay 
 
 Where, reaching through the gentle Sound, 
 Manhasset rears a wooded mound 
 And Schuyler, grimly cannon-crowned, 
 
 Disputes the narrow way. 
 
 Right merrily our angling throve! 
 By noon we sought a sheltered cove 
 Where, plunging, joyously we clove 
 The waters clear and cold. 
 
Our feast we spread, our songs were sung; 
 Then, pipes alight, at ease we flung 
 To harken while our skipper s tongue 
 Rehearsed a tale of old. 
 
 In rugged lines that vainly strive to reach the 
 
 northern side, 
 The shell-grown ledges rear their heads above the 
 
 ebbing tide. 
 There blackfish haunt, and sea-bass love the 
 
 salty flow that drones 
 Among the clefts but sailors shun the Devil s 
 
 Stepping-stones. 
 
 Long, long before the white man came, Pequot 
 
 traditions tell, 
 Habbamocko, the Evil One, that spirit wild and 
 
 fell, 
 Strode forth through fair Connecticut, and, casting 
 
 flame around, 
 Waged war to gain the fertile vales that skirt 
 
 the northern Sound. 
 
 Twelve days the demon strove with men, while 
 all the sky was red 
 
 [269] 
 
With blazing shaft and hurtling brand; and then 
 
 the tyrant fled, 
 Still battling, east along the strand in hissing 
 
 foam and spray 
 To yonder jutting spit of land that pierces Pelham 
 
 Bay. 
 
 Here, harassed by a hundred foes, the baffled 
 
 fiend forbore; 
 Across the wave-worn Stepping-stones he reached 
 
 Long Island s shore. 
 
 In that far time no boulders rude bespread the 
 
 fertile main, 
 But through the island shattered crags were thick 
 
 on hill and plain. 
 At Cold Spring Bay the vengeful fiend heaped 
 
 high a lofty pile 
 Of all the gathered bones of earth that strewed 
 
 the sandy isle. 
 
 Loud laughed the fierce Habbamocko as laughs 
 
 the angry gale! 
 Across the Sound with mighty arm he hurled the 
 
 craggy hail. 
 
 [270] 
 
On shore and hill the heavy stones were flung with 
 
 crashing din 
 To load with sterile bonds the land his prowess 
 
 failed to win. 
 
 And since that day of flaming shocks 
 
 And fierce, infernal revel, 
 Connecticut has all the rocks 
 
 Long Island keeps the Devil. 
 
A SEA CHARM 
 
 Winds that waft the fisher-fleet 
 Cool the sands from burning heat! 
 Trouble not her slender feet, 
 
 Wave-worn pebbles! 
 Crusty crabs both great and small 
 Where the billows rise and fall, 
 Quit her path, I charge ye ally 
 
 Be not rebels! 
 
 Smile above her, azure dome! 
 Lap her softly, curling foam! 
 White-ridged combers tumbling home 
 Rarely laden, 
 
 [272] 
 
Rolling in from open sea 
 Rock her high in giant glee, 
 Bearing safely back to me 
 My mermaiden! 
 
 1273] 
 
MONTGOMERY S RETURN 
 
 A MONG the general officers in the American 
 ** army at the beginning of the Revolution 
 none was of greater promise than Richard Mont 
 gomery, whose noble bearing, winning manners, 
 and splendid bravery were extolled alike by friend 
 and foe. Montgomery had been but two years 
 married to Janet Livingston at the commence 
 ment of hostilities, but he at once offered his ser 
 vices and was placed in command of the ill-fated 
 expedition to Quebec. In a bitter winter campaign 
 with but a small force he captured Montreal and 
 conquered, to quote Edmund Burke, two-thirds 
 of Canada, only to fall, December 31, 1775, lead 
 ing a desperate assault on Quebec. 
 
 In 1818 the general s remains were removed and 
 convoyed down the Hudson to be reinterred in 
 St. Paul s Chapel, New York, near the monument 
 that had been ordered in Paris by Benjamin Frank 
 lin. As the funeral barge, floating slowly down the 
 
Hudson to the booming of minute guns, passed 
 Montgomery s home near Rhinebeck, his widow, 
 looking upon the bier, fainted away in the stress 
 of what she afterward said was the proudest and 
 saddest moment of her life. 
 19 
 
 [2751 
 
MONTGOMERY S RETURN 
 
 How black the barge of trailing pali 
 
 And nodding sable plume 
 That Hudson bears by mountain wall 
 
 And fields of golden bloom 
 A cloud upon the azure flow, 
 
 A shadow in the sun, 
 To drumhead roll and church-bell toll 
 
 And boom of minute gun! 
 By night the ruddy beacons flame 
 
 On crested Kaaterskill. 
 Great heart that beat for Love and Fame 
 
 Why liest thou so still? 
 
 How blithe and brave he left his hall 
 Beside the Hudson s wave! 
 
 He heard his struggling country s call, 
 His uttermost he gave. 
 
 He bade his bonny bride farewell; 
 In wastes of nor land snow 
 
 He battled, conquered, failed, and fell- 
 Full twoscore years ago 
 
 [276] 
 
They ve wrapped him in a noble sheath, 
 
 The flag without a fleck; 
 They ve borne him from the grave beneath 
 
 The walls of old Quebec. 
 
 The land he left in doubtful strife 
 
 Has triumphed, free and blest; 
 And him that died to give it life 
 
 His people bear to rest. 
 The bride he kissed a blooming lass 
 
 Is wrinkled, old, and gray; 
 She hears the drums; she sees him pass; 
 
 She droops and swoons away. 
 
 Loud boomed the bell of high St. Paul s 
 
 From out the hollow dome; 
 And thus below those ivied walls 
 
 Montgomery came home. 
 
 [277] 
 
A DREAMER 
 
 Here lies a little boy who made believe; 
 
 Who found in sea and city, hill and star, 
 What wise men said were not; who loved to weave 
 
 Dream warp and woof more fair than things that 
 
 are. 
 He made believe that heavy toil and stress 
 
 Were only play, and sang the while he wrought; 
 He made believe that wealth and fame are less 
 
 Than faith and truth that love cannot be bought; 
 That honor lives; that far beyond the goal 
 
 That lures our eyes, to nobler ports we steer; 
 That grief was meant to forge the living soul, 
 
 And death itself is not for men to fear. 
 At last he made believe his play was played; 
 
 A kindly Hand the darkening curtain drew. 
 So well he made believe he nearly made 
 
 The world believe his make-believes were true. 
 
 278] 
 
DUTCHMAN S QUIRK 
 
 T^HE more modern streets in the upper section 
 * of Manhattan are laid out with an impartial 
 regularity that is unquestionably convenient even 
 if painfully inartistic; but the older ways of the 
 lower city often ramble with a delightful lack of 
 responsibility. There is a story in every crook and 
 curve of these old highways and byways. One bend 
 is due to the whim of the pioneer cow who trod 
 out the path which established the line of the 
 street; another is accounted for by the course of 
 a forgotten stream that still runs, deep under 
 ground; while yet another tells of some old farm 
 wall, building, honored landmark, or other token of 
 vested rights that the early roadmakers dared not 
 desecrate or disregard. 
 
 The following ballad tells the true history of the 
 sudden turn that Broadway takes at Tenth Street 
 the curve known as "The Bend at Grace 
 Church." 
 
 279 
 
DUTCHMAN S QUIRK 
 
 BROADWAY reaches northward from fair Bowling 
 
 Green 
 Direct as an arrow-flight, flexureless, clean 
 
 And certain of line 
 
 As the trunk of a pine 
 (And would that a rod of its frontage were mine!) 
 
 Quite suddenly then, 
 
 At the street numbered "Ten," 
 Above a great warehouse of laces and shawls, 
 Just south of a chapel with gray Gothic walls, 
 
 It leaps to the west 
 
 Like a roadway possessed! 
 
 In flagrant defiance 
 
 Of Reason and Science, 
 
 Macadam and Telford and Byrne, and the laws 
 Of wise Roman roadmakers. . . . Hear ye the 
 cause! 
 
 Old Hendrick Brevoort, in what matters the date? 
 In days that are gone, held a goodly estate 
 
 [280] 
 
A "bouwerie" termed in the speech of the Dutch 
 (His neighbors were Stuyvesants, Banckers, and 
 
 such) ; 
 
 And there with the hoardings of toil and frugality, 
 Lived at his ease and dispensed hospitality. 
 
 With head in the heavens, deep-rooted in earth, 
 A tulip-tree, mighty of burgeon and girth, 
 
So stately and proud, 
 
 Wide-branching, great-boughed, 
 Overshadowed his lawn with an emerald cloud. 
 Twas Hendrick s delight in the cool of its bower 
 To smoke and to ponder from hour to hour 
 
 With tankard at knee; 
 
 "For, truly/ said he, 
 
 "Of all friends, the very best friend is my tree 
 That never provokes me and never deceives, 
 But echoes my thoughts with the sigh of its 
 leaves." 
 
 The Mayor and Council had sanctioned a plan 
 To straighten the roadways that rambled and ran 
 
 Cross-hatching our isle 
 
 In a wonderful style 
 (Those happy old lanes!) so they summoned a 
 
 file 
 
 Of axmen with axes and chainmen with chains 
 And hardy surveyors of mountains and plains 
 
 And gave them instructions, 
 
 In spite of all ructions, 
 
 To follow the chart 
 
 Nor ever depart 
 
 A hair from its guidance; regardless of mart 
 [282! 
 
Or hovel or mansion, to hew out the way; 
 Whatever the damage, the city would pay. 
 Forth sailed that trigonometrical band 
 To further the work that the Fathers had planned; 
 
 And strictly obeying 
 
 The rules of surveying, 
 
 Invested with powers that challenged gainsaying, 
 They carried the roadway o er high land and low, 
 Direct as the flight of a bee or a crow, 
 
 O er meadow and lot, 
 
 Through palace and cot, 
 
 By scenes that were seemly (by wiles that were 
 not), 
 
 Through acres of flowers 
 And bird-haunted covers 
 
 And byways and bowers 
 Once sacred to lovers, 
 
 Though housewives defended beleagured dominions 
 Or voiced from their doorways unfettered opinions 
 Of levels and transits and government minions 
 Though cattle protested from buffeted sheds, 
 Though turnips and cabbages rained on their 
 heads, 
 
 Though farmer boys fought them, 
 
 Though maidens besought them, 
 
 [283] 
 
They followed their map, undismayed, till it 
 brought them 
 
 To Hendrick Brevoort at the foot of his tree. . . . 
 
 What! Yield up his friend to the axman? 
 Not he! 
 
 He called out his neighbors, the Blauvelts, the 
 Raynors; 
 
 They stirred up their vassals and sturdy retainers, 
 
 Their tenants and servants, white, yellow, and 
 black- 
 
 Dirck, Chuffee, and Hubert, Claes, Mingo, and 
 
 Jack- 
 Both merry young springalds and crusty curmud 
 geons 
 
 With ax-helves and pitchforks and scythe-blades 
 and bludgeons, 
 
 Resolved to defend 
 To the bitterest end 
 
 The right of a Dutchman to stand by his friend! 
 
 The Knights of the Sextant yet sought to prevail 
 With promise of riches or threat of the jail; 
 But, finding old Hendrick perverse or obtuse, 
 They drew off their army and patched up a 
 truce. 
 
 [284] 
 
Brevoort left the tree in the keep of his horde 
 To make good in law what he held by the sword. 
 
 He called on the Mayor, 
 
 The City Surveyor, 
 
 The Coroner, Marshal, and every taxpayer 
 Of substance or influence, urging his plea 
 Of "Woodman, oh, woodman, don t fool with 
 that tree!" 
 
 Sing hey! for the hard-headed man with a 
 
 whim! 
 The plan of a city was altered for him! 
 
 The highway led straight 
 
 To Hendrick s estate, 
 
 Then gallantly swerved 
 
 And gracefully curved 
 
 Away to the westward The tree was preserved! 
 
 (To chuckle, no doubt, 
 
 At the numberless rout 
 Of mortals his Majesty made to turn out.) 
 
 When up through the canon entitled "Broadway" 
 You re riding on business or pleasure to-day, 
 And suddenly, close to the front of Grace Church, 
 The car takes a curve with a jolt and a lurch 
 
 [285] 
 
That loosens, mayhap, 
 
 Your hold on a strap 
 
 And drops you quite neatly in somebody s lap, 
 Remember, the cause of that shameful jerk 
 Is, just as I ve shown you, a " Dutchman s Quirk!" 
 
 [286] 
 
NEW YORK 
 
 The city is cutting a way, 
 
 The gasmen are hunting a leak; 
 
 They 9 re -putting down asphalt to-day, 
 To change it for stone in a week. 
 
 The builders are raising a wall, 
 The wreckers are tearing one down. 
 
 Enacting the drama of all 
 
 Our changeable, turbulent town. 
 
 For here is an edifice meant 
 To stand for an eon or more; 
 
 And there is a gospeler s tent, 
 And there is a furniture-store. 
 
 Our suburbs are under the plow, 
 Our scaffolds are raw in the sun; 
 
 We re drunk and disorderly now, 
 
 BUT 
 9 Twill be a great place when it s done! 
 
 [287] 
 
THE "CLERMONT" 
 
 A LL contemporary accounts of the first voyage 
 ** of Fulton s little steamboat tell of the sur 
 prise or fright of those who saw the strange craft, 
 breathing smoke and flame, glide up the Hudson 
 against wind and tide. Thirty-two hours was the 
 time of this epoch-making trip from New York 
 to Albany, a distance of rather less than one 
 hundred and fifty miles; but the average time of 
 the sloops of the day between the same points was 
 four days. The invention of the steamboat, it 
 has been said, was in effect the discovery of not 
 only a "shorter route to India," that quest of 
 generations of navigators, but also of a shorter 
 route to all the coasts of all the seas. 
 
 It is generally accepted that the small paddle- 
 wheel steamer whose success revolutionized navi 
 gation was named Clermont after Clermont Manor, 
 the residence of Chancellor Robert R. Livingston, 
 Fulton s constant friend, and partner in his am- 
 [288] 
 
bitious venture; though according to an anonymous 
 and therefore negligible writer who claims to have 
 been a passenger on the first trip, Katherine of 
 Clermont was the name painted on the historic 
 craft. 
 
 [289] 
 
THE "CLERMONT" 
 
 A ROAR of smoke from the iron stack 
 
 That frights the ghosts of the haunted Hollow; 
 
 A churn of foam, and a broadening track 
 For all the fleets of the world to follow. 
 
 She asks no aid of the swollen sail; 
 
 Her engines pant and her timbers quiver; 
 She lifts her bows to the northern gale 
 
 And breasts the tide of the lordly river. 
 [290] 
 
The round-eyed host at his tavern door 
 Lets fall the pipe and the frothing flagon; 
 
 The brown-winged sloops of the Tappan shore 
 Make frightened way for the snorting dragon. 
 
 The scythe-men group and the binders flock 
 To gaze in awe at the floating wonder; 
 
 The red deer stamps on the basalt rock 
 And bounds away to the Hill of Thunder. 
 
 A fabled road to the far Cathay 
 
 Old Hudson sought through our western High 
 lands; 
 But here s the key to a shorter way 
 
 Through all the seas to the farthest islands. 
 
 The Craftsman s hand and the Thinker s dream 
 Shall bind the lands with a shortening tether; 
 
 The wit of Man and the might of Steam 
 Shall draw the rims of the world together. 
 
 A roar of smoke from her iron stack 
 
 That frights old ghosts from the haunted Hollow; 
 
 A churn of foam, and a broadening track 
 For all the fleets of the world to follow. 
 
 20 [ 2 9i 1 
 
GREAT IS DIANA OF THE 
 MANNAHATTOES! 
 
 Northward! Northward! Goddess of the Tower, 
 Driving back the dappled cloud. 
 
 Bend thy golden bow. 
 
 Mignonette and violet and autumn s tawny flower 
 Fill with bloom and vague perfume 
 The humming ways below. 
 
 Down from his mountains Hudson rolls away, 
 Pouring forth their balsam breath 
 
 Upon our jaded strands; 
 Eastward, westward, southward to the Bay 
 Rock like bare November woods 
 The masts of many lands. 
 
 Day lifts up the hymnal of the street; 
 Night hath lamps 
 
 Of silver for thy shrine; 
 Air-drift, cloud-drift play about thy feet; 
 Moonlight, starlight, 
 Touch thy brow divine. 
 
 [292] 
 
Ward our gates, Wielder of the Bow! 
 Guard with us a nation s weal, 
 
 Regent of the skies! 
 Crowd with keels the winnowed waves 
 
 That round our island flow! 
 Shop and mart to thee shall raise 
 
 The smoke of sacrifice! 
 
 [293] 
 
THE HALL OF FAME 
 
 University Heights, overlooking the Har- 
 lem, stands the Hall of Fame erected to 
 honor the names of great Americans and dedi 
 cated in June, 1901. According to a rule laid 
 down by the founder, no names might be inscribed 
 on the tablets of the building save those of men 
 who were born in territory that was included in 
 the United States at the date of the deed of gift. 
 This regulation necessarily excluded the names of 
 some who were largely instrumental in laying the 
 foundations of the nation. 
 
 [294] 
 
THE HALL OF FAME 
 ALL-HALLOWE EN, A.D. 2000 
 
 A NOBLE fane of marble wall and moonlit colonnade 
 Looks southward from a crest that rears o er 
 
 Haarlem s gentle glade 
 
 To watch the jeweled city s rest in majesty serene 
 The calm, strong sleep that midnight gives our 
 
 sea-enthroned queen 
 Looks westward to the Palisades, whose frowning 
 
 foreheads throw 
 An even shade upon the gleam of Hudson s silver 
 
 flow. 
 
 The hall is filled with wondrous light and faint 
 
 sweet minstrelsy 
 
 And softly echoed laugh and song of elfin revelry; 
 Tis Hallowe en! and once again to view those 
 
 walls, repair 
 The spirits of the mighty dead whose names are 
 
 graven there. 
 
 [295] 
 
Within is mirth and merriment among the chosen 
 
 Great; 
 Without, a surly Porter stands to guard the sacred 
 
 gate 
 Against each unelected Shade that foreign birth 
 
 must claim; 
 For thus decreed the gentle soul that reared the 
 
 Hall of Fame. 
 
 Forward stepped a graceful sprite, 
 Quick of action, straight and slight, 
 Ruddy-hued, with tawny hair, 
 Free of speech yet debonair; 
 One round hole (ah, mortal hurt!) 
 Through the neatly ruffled shirt. 
 "Open, Porter! I would lief 
 Greet again my noble chief, 
 He whose service was my school 
 First in warfare, then in rule. 
 Of his dearest I was one 
 Alexander Hamilton." 
 
 Answered the Porter in sullen-voiced scorn, 
 "Ere I admit thee say where thou wast born." 
 
 "Where the tropic breeze beguiles 
 On the sea-kissed Leeward Isles 
 
 [296] 
 
First I breathed. But well ye ken 
 All our breed were Britons then." 
 
 "To all but the home-born this portal is barred, 
 Hie back to thy barrow in Trinity Yard!" 
 
 A stalwart form in the Blue and Buff, 
 With a shot-rent sash of the silken stuff, 
 With shoulders squared and head held high, 
 A statesman s brow and a soldier s eye, 
 The mouth where butter wouldn t melt, 
 And the lilting laugh of the dauntless Celt, 
 Sprang up the slope in the moonlight dim 
 And shouted clear to the Warden grim, 
 "Unbar the gate, my man, for me! 
 Make way for Dick Montgomerie!" 
 (So rang that voice before his fall 
 On old Quebec s ensanguined wall.) 
 
 Again spake the Porter: "I know not thy worth. 
 Proclaim, ere I open, the land of thy birth." 
 
 "My faith and troth! yer wit is flat! 
 I thought my tongue would tell ye that! 
 In Ireland, sure, I first drew breath; 
 But what of birth so long since death?" 
 
 [297] 
 
"No foreign-born spirit may enter these walls. 
 Go back to thy tomb in the crypt of St. Paul s !" 
 
 "Room for the governor!" iron-jawed 
 Stout Peter Stuyvesant walks abroad, 
 Quitting his charnel in old St. Mark s, 
 Up through the tangle of streets and parks, 
 Stumping away on his wooden peg 
 And the high-heeled shoe of his one sound leg. 
 Monarch of Shadows, he governs still, 
 Ruler by force of a stubborn will. 
 Sharp and direct was the word he spake: 
 "Rules that mislike me I dare to break. 
 Open the portal, ye varlet, quick! 
 Ware of the swing of mine oaken stick! 
 Forward, my heroes ! * And, at his call, 
 Freely they strode through the ringing hall. 
 Round them the banded Immortals drew, 
 Hailed them as brothers and comrades true. 
 There, in the center, I saw them stand 
 Pressing their lips to the Founder s hand, 
 Who, with a pencil of golden flame, 
 Entered new names on the Roll of Fame. 
 
 [298] 
 
Epilogue 
 
 THE BOOK LINE 
 
 Rivington Street Branch, New York Public Library. 
 
 COME, ye that despair of the land 
 
 Which the Future shall know 
 Who doubt what the years that expand 
 
 In their fulness must show 
 Who grasp not the thing which shall be 
 
 When deliverance comes 
 To millions in bondage and see, 
 
 At the verge of the slums, 
 These foreign-born children that march 
 
 In their hundreds and more 
 In sunshine and storm, through the arch 
 
 Of the library door! 
 
 Their race? Ah, what matters their race 
 
 To our generous Mold 
 Of Nations! Yet, if ye would trace 
 
 All the record unrolled, 
 [299] 
 
Take heart from the days that are dead 
 
 For the fathers of these 
 With Lief or with Eric the Red 
 
 Braved mysterious seas, 
 Or followed Yermak through the snows 
 
 Of a boreal dome, 
 Or gave to the eagles the foes 
 
 Of Imperial Rome; 
 Or tented with David, or ranked 
 
 In the Balkans those swords 
 That bulwarked all Europe, unthanked, 
 
 From the Ottoman hordes. 
 Aye, old at the time of the Flood, 
 
 Still the law is the same; 
 The Builder shall spring from the blood 
 
 Whence the Warrior came. 
 
 They trail through the alley and mart 
 
 To this Palace of Tomes 
 Wee urchins, red-hatted and swart 
 
 As their underworld gnomes, 
 And hundreds of quaint little maids 
 
 Wearing ribands of green 
 Or scarlet on duplicate braids, 
 
 Quick-eyed, orderly, clean, 
 
 [300] 
 
And silent. Some take from the shelves 
 
 Of the volumes arow 
 Those legends of goblins and elves 
 
 That we loved long ago; 
 Yet more choose the stories of men 
 
 Whom a nation reveres 
 Of Lincoln and Washington, then 
 
 Of the bold pioneers 
 Who plowed in a blood-sprinkled sod, 
 
 Whose strong hands caused to rise 
 That Temple which these, under God, 
 
 Yet shall rear to the skies! 
 
 THE END 
 
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